[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 142 (Wednesday, November 1, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11486-S11487]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               ERGONOMICS

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, OSHA has been attempting to implement an 
ergonomics standard for the past ten years. But each year, Congress has 
delayed the standard. And now, even though a bipartisan group of 
appropriators agreed to a reasonable compromise on this issue late 
Sunday night, the Republican leadership rejected it--because the 
business lobbyists demanded it and insisted that millions of workers 
wait even longer for a safe and healthy workplace.
  Each year, 1.7 million workers suffer from ergonomic injuries, and 
nearly 600,000 workers lose a day or more of work because of these 
injuries suffered on the job. Ergonomic injuries account for over one-
third of all serious job-related injuries.
  These injuries are painful and often crippling. They range from 
carpal tunnel syndrome, to severe back injuries, to disorders of the 
muscles and nerves. Carpal tunnel syndrome keeps workers off the job 
longer than any other workplace injury. This injury alone causes 
workers to lose an average of more than 25 days, compared to 17 days 
for fractures and 20 days for amputations.
  The ergonomics issue is also a women's issue, because women workers 
are disproportionately affected by these injuries. Women make up 46 
percent of the overall workforce--but in 1998 they accounted for 64 
percent of repetitive motion injuries and 71 percent of carpal tunnel 
cases.
  The good news is that these injuries are preventable. The National 
Academy of Sciences and the National Institute of Occupational Safety 
and Health have both found that obvious adjustments in the workplace 
can prevent workers from suffering ergonomic injuries and illnesses.
  Congress has a responsibility to ensure that the nation's worker 
protection laws keep pace with changes in the workforce. Early in this 
century, the industrial age created deadly new conditions for large 
numbers of the nation's workers. When miners were killed or maimed in 
explosion after explosion, we enacted the Federal Coal Mine Safety and 
Health Act. As workplace hazards became more subtle, but no less 
dangerous, we responded by passing the Occupational Safety and Health 
Act to address hazards such as asbestos and cotton dust.
  Now, as the workplace moves from the industrial to the information 
age, our laws must evolve again to address the emerging dangers to 
American workers. Ergonomic injuries are one of the principal hazards 
of the modern American workplace--and we owe it to the 600,000 workers 
who suffer serious ergonomic injuries each year to address this problem 
now.
  Ergonomic injuries affect the lives of working men and women across 
the country. They injure nurses who regularly lift and move patients. 
They injure construction workers who lift heavy objects. They harm 
assembly-line workers whose tasks consist of constant repetitive 
motions. They injure data entry workers who type on computer keyboards 
all day. Even if we are not doing these jobs ourselves, we all know 
people who do. They are mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, sons 
and daughters, friends and neighbors--and they deserve our help.
  We need to help workers like Beth Piknick of Hyannis, Massachusetts, 
who was an intensive care nurse for 21 years, before a preventable back 
injury required her to have a spinal fusion operation and spend two 
years in rehabilitation. Although she wants to work, she can no longer 
do so. In her own words, ``The loss of my ability to take care of 
patients led to a clinical depression. . . . My ability to take care of 
patients--the reason I became a nurse--is gone. My injury--and all the 
losses it has entailed--were preventable.''
  We need to help workers like Elly Leary, an auto assembler at the 
now-closed General Motors Assembly plant in Framingham, Massachusetts. 
Like many, many of her co-workers, she suffered a series of ergonomic 
injuries--including carpal tunnel syndrome and tendinitis. Like others, 
she tried switching hands to do her job. She tried varying the sequence 
of her routine. She even bid on other jobs. But nothing helped. Today, 
years after her injuries, when she wakes up in the morning, her hands 
are in a claw-like shape. To get them to open, she has to run hot water 
on them.

[[Page S11487]]

  We need to help workers like Charley Richardson, a shipfitter at 
General Dynamics in Quincy, Massachusetts in the mid-1980's. He 
suffered a career-ending back injury when he was told to lift a 75 
pound piece of steel to reinforce a deck. Although he continued to try 
to work, he found that on many days, he could not perform the lifting 
and the use of heavy tools. For years afterwards, his injury prevented 
him from participating in basic activities. But the loss that hurt the 
most was having to tell his children that they couldn't sit on his lap 
for more than a few minutes, because it was too painful. To this day, 
he cannot sit for long without pain.
  We need to protect workers like Wendy Scheinfeld of Brighton, 
Massachusetts, a model employee in the insurance industry. Colleagues 
say she often put in extra hours at work to ``get the job done.'' She 
developed carpal tunnel syndrome, using a computer at work. As a 
result, Wendy lost the use of her hands, and is now permanently unable 
to do her job, drive a car, play the cello, or shop for groceries.
  Even though it may be too late to help Beth, Elly, Charley and Wendy, 
workers just like them deserve an ergonomics standard to protect them 
from such debilitating injuries.
  As long ago as 1990, Secretary of Labor Elizabeth Dole in the Bush 
Administration called ergonomic injuries ``one of the nation's most 
debilitating across-the-board worker safety and health illnesses.'' 
Since that time, over 2,000 scientific studies have examined the issue, 
including a comprehensive review by the National Academy of Sciences. 
All of these studies tell us the same thing--it's long past time to 
enact an ergonomics standard to protect the health of American workers 
and prevent these debilitating injuries in the workplace.
  Last fall, when we considered the Labor-HHS appropriations bill, 
opponents of an ergonomics standard wanted us to wait for the National 
Academy of Sciences to complete a further study before OSHA establishes 
a standard. But it was just another delaying tactic. As we said then, 
over 2,000 studies on ergonomics have already been carried out.
  In 1997, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 
reviewed 600 of the most important of those studies. In 1998, the 
National Academy of Sciences reviewed the studies again. Congress even 
asked the General Accounting Office to conduct its own study.
  The National Academy of Sciences found that work clearly causes 
ergonomic injuries. They concluded that ``the positive relationship 
between the occurrence of musculoskeletal disorders and the conduct of 
work is clear.'' The National Institute for Occupational Safety and 
Health agreed. They found ``strong evidence of an association between 
MSDs and certain work-related physical factors.''
  The Academy also found that ergonomics programs are effective. As the 
Academy found, ``Research clearly demonstrates that specific 
interventions can reduce the reported rate of musculoskeltal disorders 
for workers who perform high-risk tasks.'' The GAO has concluded that 
good ergonomics practices are good business. Its report declared, 
``Officials at all the facilities we visited believed their ergonomics 
programs yielded benefits, including reductions in workers' 
compensation costs.''
  The truth is that the Labor Department's ergonomics rule is based on 
sound science. In addition to the National Academy of Sciences and the 
National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, medical and 
scientific groups have expressed widespread support for moving forward 
with an ergonomics rule. The American College of Occupational and 
Environmental Medicine, representing over 7,000 physicians, has stated 
that ``there is . . . no reason for OSHA to delay the rule-making 
process while the NAS panel conducts its review.'' The American Academy 
of Orthopedic Surgeons, representing 16,000 surgeons, the American 
Association of Occupational Health Nurses, representing 13,000 nurses, 
and the American Public Health Association, representing 50,000 
members, all agree that an ergonomics rule is necessary and based on 
sound science.
  Many members of the business community support ergonomics 
protections, because they agree that good ergonomics practices are good 
business. Currently, businesses spend $15 to 20 billion each year in 
workers' compensation costs related to these disorders. Ergonomic 
injuries account for one dollar of every three dollars spent for 
workers' compensation. If businesses reduce these injuries, they will 
reap the benefits of lower costs, greater productivity, and less 
absenteeism.
  That's certainly true for Tom Albin of Minnesota Mining and 
Manufacturing, who said, ``Our experience has shown that incorporating 
good ergonomics into our manufacturing and administrative processes can 
be effective in reducing the number and severity of work-related 
musculoskeletal disorders, which not only benefits our employees, but 
also makes good business sense.''
  Similarly, Peter Meyer of Sequins International Quality Braid has 
said, ``We have reduced our compensation claims for carpal tunnel 
syndrome through an effective ergonomics program. Our productivity has 
increased dramatically, and our absenteeism has decreased 
drastically.''
  This ergonomics rule is necessary, because only one-third of 
employers currently have effective ergonomics programs. Further delay 
is unacceptable, because it leaves too many workers unprotected and 
open to career-ending injuries. Ten years is long enough. Since OSHA 
began working on this standard in 1990, more than 6.1 million workers 
have suffered serious injuries from workplace ergonomic hazards.
  It is time to end these injuries--and end all the misinformation too. 
The current attack on OSHA's ergonomics standard is just the latest in 
a long series of mindless attacks by business against needed worker 
protections for worker's health and safety. Whose side is this Congress 
on? American employees deserve greater protection, not further delay. 
It's time to stop breaking the promise made to workers, and start 
supporting this long overdue ergonomics standard now.

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