**Comments on the Department of Labor\'s Proposed Health Risk Assessment
Changes**

**29 CFR Part 2, RIN 1290-AA23, 8/29/08, 73 FR No.169, pgs 50909-15.**

**Submitted electronically September 29, 2008**

Leon R. Sequeira

US Department of Labor, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Policy

200 Constitution Ave., NW S-2312

Washington D.C. 20210

Dear Mr. Sequeira,

We are submitting comments on the Department of Labor\'s proposed rule
change that will establish new and unnecessary impediments to much
needed health standards for the protection of workers in the United
States. Current standards are inadequately protective in many respects,
including:

\- failure to reflect current knowledge of hazards in existing standards

\- failure to include most newly developed chemical and material
hazards.

The latter failure results, in part, from DOL\'s failure to require full
hazard and safety information on new chemicals and materials, leading to
long delays in obtaining protective standards. New chemicals and
materials have no inherent right to a presumption of innocence, but
rather should be required to be proven safe before any human exposures
are allowed. The lessons learned from a denial of the harm done by
asbestos and silica must not be repeated with nanotubules and
non-ionizing radiation.

 

The very serious ongoing public health shortcomings are directly
relevant to DOL\'s new proposal, which would incur additional delays and
further retard a dangerously slow process. Risk assessment can be
carried out efficiently, and should [serve public health]{.underline},
rather than serving as an excuse for inaction, as is now the case in too
many federal evaluations. DOL\'s proposal adds unnecessary steps and
delays to a system that has had a nearly complete failure to promulgate
essential regulations in recent years.

There is extensive evidence regarding ongoing harm to workers from
inadequately regulated chemicals and the economic toll that takes on our
country.\* The DOL proposal would incur a greater toll, leaving workers
unprotected for longer time periods. The workplace exposure limits for
carcinogens are a clear example, with outdated exposure limits that
incur risks far in excess of de minimis. At the individual level,
patients suffer unnecessarily from asbestos-related illnesses due to
regulatory delays. A teacher with asbestosis and intractable pain was
exposed when her father, a taconite miner, hugged her at the end of each
shift. He unknowingly delivered a lifetime of pain and shortness of
breath due to inadequate workplace protections. Yet taconite remains
unregulated under asbestos rules, a dangerous and inexcusable situation.

Delays in regulation clearly result in excess exposure, disease and
death. The proposed changes do not contribute to the integrity of
regulatory processes, as argued, instead imposing roadblocks to safety
and harming the public. The Department of Labor must establish an
efficient regulatory process utilizing evidence that is free of
conflicts of interest, and insure that healthy workers are their primary
objective. The current proposal is antithetical to this urgent public
health need and should be withdrawn.

We submit these comments as health professionals who have worked on
behalf of public health for many decades. We believe the United States
can be a far better place for all people if our workforce is adequately
protected and our public health agencies are truely dedicated to
improving the health of our citizens.

Sincerely,

Kathleen M. Burns, Ph.D.

Director, Sciencecorps

168 Burlington St.

Lexington, Massachusetts, 02420

 

Michael R. Harbut, MD, MPH, FCCP\
CoDirector, National Center for Vermiculite and Asbestos-Related
Cancers\
Karmanos Cancer Institute, Wayne State University\
Chief, Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine\
118 N. Washington\
Royal Oak, Michigan 48067-1751

[\*http://coeh.berkeley.edu/docs/news/08-01-17_dailyenv.pdf](http://coeh.berkeley.edu/docs/news/08-01-17_dailyenv.pdf)