OSHA Lab Standard Components

Obviously working in a lab can be very dangerous, that is why it is important to have standards set in laboratories so that the people working in them know what is safe and what is not safe.  OSHA has a standard for laboratory safety to make sure that people are being safe while working.  But what does the OSHA Standard include?  Well, according to the Standard, found in 29 CFR 1910.1450, the main components are Monitoring/PELs, Information and Trainings, Medical Consultation, Hazard Identification, Recordkeeping and Respiratory Protection.  What is a PEL?  A PEL is the permissible exposure limit.  So, the monitoring/PEL section in the standard is all about discussing how you monitor chemicals/fumes and how much exposure someone can have to a substance.  In the Information and Training section contains the Hazard Communication, or HazCom which describes hazards that can happen in the lab when dealing with certain substances.  It is important to look at the HazCom when dealing with a new substance, because if you haven't worked with it before you may be unaware of possible hazardous exposures.  This section also tells information about the signs of possible symptoms if an exposure ever occurs.  This is important when talking about different chemicals because different chemicals may lead to different symptoms. Also, how to use personal protective equipment is described in this section as well as how to recognize hazards in the lab.  Medical consultation occurs whenever there are signs of symptoms, as well as if the monitoring shows that the exposure limit has been exceeded.  This also happens if there is an accident in the lab, such as a spill.  No matter what the accident may be, there will be medical consultation afterwards because of the possibility of an exposure that could be hazardous to the employees health.   Getting medical treatment does not cost the employee anything.  Labels need to be easily read for hazard identification purposes.  This is a very important area of this standard.  If there are chemicals that are not properly labeled in the lab, someone working might think they are using a chemical that is not as toxic as what they are really using, or they might be mixing chemicals together and thinking they are using a different chemical, mix it with another and cause exposures that could be very dangerous to ones health.  Respiratory protection will not cost the employee anything. Recordkeeping is done for many things in the lab and has to be done for every employee.  This includes medical records and records concerning exposures as well.  These medical records are kept for 30 years after an employee works in a lab.  Why you may ask?  Well, if someone was working in a lab years ago and become sick years later after they worked there, the records to what they possibly could have been exposed to will be very helpful with the medical knowledge of the former employee.  Those are the main components of the OSHA Lab Standard.  I hope this blog was helpful in providing information about this topic. 

Ethics

What are ethics?  You may have heard this word used before but may not have fully understood what it meant.  Well, according to the site http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ethics , ethics are "a system of moral principles".  Basically, ethics are the set of values that differentiate right from wrong when you think about the outcomes of an action.  So, now that we know what ethics are, when are they used?  Well, after class discussion about the article, "The Lawyer Who Became DuPont's Worst Nightmare" by The New York Times, we came up with six different areas of where ethics can be applied.  We decided that one area was ethics in government.  We actually discovered three areas within government that ethics can be applied.  These three areas are federal, state and corporate.  The next three areas where we discussed ethics are personal ethics, community ethics, and professional ethics.  In this blog, I will only be going into detail about one of these areas as it relates to the article we read.  The area of ethics that I will be discussing in this blog is the area of professional ethics.  In the article, the farmer was noticing that his cows were acting strange and were showing signs of being sick.  Some were even dying.  The farmer believed that the DuPont factory waste was the cause of the weird behavior and sickness of his cattle.  The local veterinarians of the town came to check the farmers cattle, however, said that the waste was not causing this sickness to his cattle and even though he had been taking care of cattle his whole life, they said that he was mistreating them and not taking good enough care of them.  Now, these veterinarians were paid off by DuPont.  The company brings in almost all the money that the towns receives.  To keep getting paid, the veterinarians made the choice to lie to the farmer about the health of his cattle in order to cover up the hazardous waste that DuPont was sending out.  The veterinarians also made this decision because if they went against DuPont for any reason, the entire town would ignore them and not speak to them.  The people of the town do that to anyone who goes against DuPont because they rely on it so much.  This act by the veterinarians has a lot to do with professional ethics.  From an ethics standpoint, you have to stop and wonder if the vets did the right thing here, by giving false information about animals when it is their job to take care of them.  They become vets to help and save animals, yet in this case to get more money, they are actually doing the opposite of what their job really is to help DuPont cover up their mess.  The farmer also lost friends he had known forever because they wanted nothing to do with the fight against DuPont.  Nobody would pump his gas, doctors refused to treat him, and he even had to change churches multiple times.  Those are also major examples of how professional ethics was involved in this case.  The doctors would not even discuss anything with him.  Isn't that what doctors are suppose to do?  Talk to people about their health?  This is a great example of how ethics can play a huge role in someone's profession.  In this case, the doctors are refusing to help someone who is seeking help that they need.  Ethics can make people do many things, and I hope this blog provided examples of how ethics can have a huge effect when dealing with someone's profession.  There is a certain standard of ethics when dealing in your profession and this article shows us that even within their professions, people make different decisions about ethics based on the circumstances.