Biden government drafts rules on heat hazards in the workplace

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WASHINGTON – The Biden government is working across federal agencies to address the health effects of heat, including the very first labor standards to protect workers from extreme heat, as part of a growing recognition of the dangers of climate change.

The Occupational Safety and Health Agency, part of the Department of Labor, will develop its first heat exposure rule, designed to protect people who work in agriculture, construction and outdoor delivery services, as well as workers in warehouses, factories and kitchens.

It comes after a summer that saw record heat waves in the western United States and British Columbia that scientists say were made even more extreme by climate change. According to National weather service, Extreme heat is the country’s No. 1 weather-related killer.

“In the past few weeks I have traveled across the country to see firsthand the devastating human and economic consequences of extreme weather made worse by climate change,” President Biden said in a statement. “Rising temperatures pose an immediate threat to millions of American workers exposed to the elements, children in schools without air conditioning, seniors in nursing homes with no refrigeration resources, and especially disadvantaged communities. My administration will not leave the Americans alone to face this threat. “

The administration said it will form an interagency working group on heat illness prevention to provide a better understanding of the challenges and the best ways to protect workers from heat injuries.

In addition to writing the new rule, the Department of Labor will prioritize heat-related interventions and labor inspections on days when the heat index exceeds 80 degrees, the administration said. The department is also working to finalize a program targeting industries at higher risk of heat injuries and focus more resources on inspections before next summer.

Experts said rules and guidelines to protect workers from extreme heat are long overdue – although depending on the details of how they are phrased, they could become expensive for employers.

“Heat sickness has been underreported and treated for a long time – and now it’s getting hotter,” said David Hondula, professor at Arizona State University‘s School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning.

Dr. Hondula noted that some states and professional organizations, such as the United States Soccer Federation, are already placing restrictions on when and how long workers can perform their duties in the heat.

Some of these guidelines, which could affect a federal rule, include mandatory breaks for people who work at high temperatures for certain periods of time and, in some cases, requirements that stop work when the heat index exceeds a certain level. They also include requirements that employers provide shade, water and air conditioning whenever possible, and that employers provide access to medical care for workers who are regularly exposed to heat.

However, should such guidelines be converted into federal regulation, it could increase costs or decrease productivity for some industries – particularly requiring that construction or other outdoor work be completely halted under certain heat conditions, said Dr. Hondula.

“It could be said that it could get expensive,” he said, although he found that the economy was already bearing the burden of the illnesses and deaths associated with exposure to heat. “Maybe we’re already bearing some of the productivity costs,” he said.

Marc Freedman, vice president of workplace policy for the US Chamber of Commerce, said his organization looks forward to participating in OSHA’s rulemaking process. However, he noted that there were “unique difficulties” in creating a heat safety standard.

“Heat is a very difficult hazard to control because there is no common risk threshold and people react differently to exposure,” said Mr. Freedman.

In addition to the new heat standards in the workplace, the Ministry of Health has already issued guidelines to help the low income energy support program, which has been used in the past to help people unable to pay heating bills in extreme cold, reduce the cost of home air to cover -Conditioning and cooling centers in extreme heat.

And the Environmental Protection Agency is using funds from a stimulus bill passed earlier this year to provide technical assistance in creating neighborhood cooling centers in public schools.

The new OSHA rule is one of the first direct government responses to an emerging area of ​​research showing that extreme heat is harming and killing more workers and vulnerable populations.

A study published this summer found that heat contributes to far more workplace injuries than official records, and those injuries are concentrated in the poorest workers. Hotter days not only mean more cases of heat stroke or exhaustion, but also injuries from falls, collisions with vehicles or improper use of machines because heat makes it difficult to concentrate, the researchers found.

And after Hurricane Ida hit New Orleans this month, more people died in the city from the heat in the aftermath of the storm than were killed by floods.

A study published in May found that the growing risk of overlapping heat waves and power outages poses a serious threat to major American cities. Power outages have increased more than 60 percent since 2015 as climate change exacerbated heat waves, according to research in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. Using computer models to study three major US cities, the authors estimated that a combined power outage and heatwave would expose at least two-thirds of residents to heat exhaustion or heat stroke.

And other research suggests that rising temperatures even widen the gap in racial performance in schools in the United States, further evidence that the burden of climate change falls disproportionately on people of color. In published a paper In the journal Nature Human Behavior, researchers found that students performed worse on standardized tests for each additional day at 80 degrees Fahrenheit or higher, even after checking for other factors. These effects have been observed in 58 countries, suggesting that Relationship between heat exposure and decreased learning.

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