The health and safety of workers on the job is a human right; and, as a nation, the United States is failing to protect its workers.

"People exchange their time, energy and skills for wages," says Darryl Alexander, senior associate director of the AFT's health and safety program. "They shouldn't have to trade their health. It's not a commodity to be traded away. Workers are entitled to working conditions that are healthful and safe.

"Our regulatory agency, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration [OSHA], has really failed to promulgate the kind of regulations we need for the most common workplace hazards. There is no regulatory framework."

Common workplace hazards

Indoor air quality and work-related violence are obvious workplace hazards. But so are physical stresses, such as repetitive motions that lead to carpal tunnel syndrome or tendonitis, and environmental factors like poor lighting that can cause eye strain and headaches.

"There are no ergonomic standards, so workers today bear the burden of back injuries and other musculoskeletal injuries that put people out of work prematurely," says Alexander. "There are no standards for indoor air quality, yet most of us are working in office or institutional environments like healthcare facilities or prisons. Then, of course, for many workers who deal with clients and the public, there is work-related violence. There is nothing about violence in the guidelines for the social services sector, hospitals and the retail sector, so people are at risk. The list goes on."

In the absence of federal OSHA standards or state regulations, the General Duty Clause of the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act is front and center in efforts to protect worker health and safety, says Jonathan Rosen, director of the AFT's New York State Public Employees Federation's (PEF) health and safety department. Under the clause, employers have an obligation to protect workers from serious and recognized "hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm" to employees.

Rosen says the need for unions to educate managers, administration officials and lawmakers about health and safety issues cannot be overstated, particularly in the absence of regulations dealing with these issues.

"You want them to have the same knowledge base you have so they don't deny there is a problem," he says.

Moreover, Rosen says we should not expect results over night. In June 2006, a PEF-backed workplace violence prevention bill was signed into law. "The workplace violence law was 14 years in the making," says Rosen, noting that for all PEF's progress, including securing contract language and establishing labor-management partnerships to address workplace health and safety issues, all the union's goals have not been achieved.

Contributing factors to workplace violence

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, there are 33 violent crimes in the workplace for every 1,000 employees in state, city and local government, compared with 10 per 1,000 employees at private companies.

Law enforcement officers and correctional officers are at the highest risk: 261 incidents per 1,000 workers and 156 per 1,000 workers, respectively. For social workers/psychiatrists, there are 68 incidents per 1,000; and the rate among custodial care providers in the mental health field is 69 violent victimizations per 1,000 workers.

One contributing factor is short staffing, says Rosen, particularly in the areas of mental health, social services and juvenile justice institutions. "The politics are if you want to cut big government, and you want to give tax breaks to the rich, you cut the essential services in the agencies that serve the least political constituencies," he says.

Understaffing isn't the only government economics issue in play, either. The average cost per inmate per year in state prisons is $22,650, according to the latest information from the Bureau of Justice Statistics. The cost per patient at an inpatient mental health facility is at least 10 times higher, says Rosen. "This explains why there are more mentally ill in prison instead of a state mental health facility."

One member's story of workplace violence

Scott Towery discounts much of the violence he has endured as a mental health development and disability technician at Kansas' Larned State Hospital. "The everyday stuff that we deal with are patients spitting on us and throwing objects at us" such as chairs and trash cans, says the Kansas Organization of State Employees (KOSE) member. "There's a lot of verbal abuse, too. It's really bad because it breaks down the staff. The stress level out here is tremendous."

Injuries to direct care staff at Larned have been on the uptick, Towery says. "We've had a lot of staff members carted out of here by ambulance."

In March 2007, Towery suffered a shoulder injury while he was breaking up a fight between two patients. He had surgery on his shoulder in June, which was followed by six months of physical therapy; but he was back at work just 12 days after the procedure with use of only one arm. He was assigned to control-panel duty-monitoring hallways and entrances and unlocking doors and gates-for the Security Behavior Unit, which houses the most dangerous mentally ill patients from the criminal justice system. "Under normal conditions, you need three arms to do the job safely," he says.

Towery knows first hand, the lower the staff-to-patient ratio, the higher the risk of assault. "Our ratio is five staff to about 40 patients on each unit," he says. "When I first started in 1993, there were eight or nine staff on each unit."

Short-staffing means there aren't as many employees to manage and care for patients-and watch the backs of their co-workers. At Larned, it also means a lot of overtime. "People are getting tired, sick and worn down," says Towery.

Thanks to his local, KOSE, however, hospital administration-and lawmakers in Topeka-are hearing employees' concerns. One recent development, Towery says, is that roving security officers have been added to monitor the different buildings on the hospital's campus.

One local's battle for clean air

In May 2005, Joella Bouchard Mudry was admitted to the hospital with cranial bleeding. Her right side was paralyzed.

Mudry, a member of the AFT's Administrative and Residual Employees Union (A&R) in Connecticut is among several hundred state employees who have been victimized by a silent stalker at their workplace: mold, bacteria, dust-and toxins-that are compromising respiratory and immune systems one breath at a time at 25 Sigourney Street in Hartford.
Research has shown that high concentrations of the mold that was found in Mudry's office causes cranial bleeding. Although the bleeding subsided and she regained strength on her right side, Mudry still suffered from severe respiratory problems, initially diagnosed in October 1999, a little more than three years after her Department of Revenue Services (DRS) office was relocated to the Sigourney Street building.

"In researching asthma, I found out that asthma is usually hereditary," Mudry says. "I am the youngest of 16 children and none of them has asthma. I knew something was terribly amiss and I requested a base-line test. A base-line test is when you get your breathing tested the first thing Monday morning and then you return on Friday evening after work for another test. It was then that they discovered that I had occupational asthma."

Mudry retired in 2006. One month after her retirement, the state approved her in-service disability retirement.

"Sick Building Syndrome is described as a building whose occupants experience an acute health and comfort effect that is linked to time spent in a building," says A&R member Terri Morse, who also works in the building for DRS.

For more than a decade, A&R has been on task, filing complaints, commissioning studies, ordering inspections by various authorities, including the state's Division of Occupational Safety and Health and the Centers for Disease Control's National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. Armed with information, the local started contacting elected officials.

"Most health professionals agreed employees were getting sick in the building," says A&R member Anna Crawford. "While the University of Connecticut Occupational Health and Safety Clinic removed a few sick employees from the building, many sick employees continued to work there."

Mudry, Morse and Crawford have been among the most vocal advocates for the health and safety of workers in the building. "I would like to say we had a happy ending, but this is not the case," says Crawford. "Employees still choose between their health and their livelihood, but public officials are aware of the issues."

If there is one thing A&R wants all AFT Public Employees members to know, it is that "a sick building is a political issue and not a health issue," Crawford says. "There are no enforcement guidelines for OSHA or health departments to follow in dealing with a sick building. ... While many issues at this building remain, only through political pressure imposed through legislative hearings, radio, television and newspaper stories, petitions, and visits to senators and representatives have any repairs been made."