09.27.19

Scott Statement on Revisions to OSHA’s Beryllium Standards for Construction and Shipyards

WASHINGTON – Chairman Bobby Scott (VA-03) issued the following statement after the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) announced today that it is vacating the June 27, 2017, proposed rule to roll back protections for construction and maritime workers from exposure to beryllium.  That proposal would have eliminated ancillary protections that had been included in OSHA’s final beryllium standards issued on January 9, 2017. The compliance date for the ancillary provision will now be extended from March 2018 to September 2020. 

 “I am relieved that OSHA has finally reversed course on its plan to eliminate essential health and safety protections for maritime and construction workers exposed to beryllium.  Had OSHA gone forward with its original proposal, it would have marked the first time in history that the agency had weakened a health standard protecting workers from a known human carcinogen.

 “When OSHA issued the original beryllium standard in January 2017, OSHA confirmed that medical surveillance, exposure monitoring, and training are necessary to protect exposed workers from cancer and other serious diseases caused by beryllium exposure. That is why the House passed legislation forbidding OSHA from rolling back these health and safety protections earlier this year.

“Now that this issue has been resolved, OSHA should focus their resources on more useful purposes, such as finalizing its workplace violence or infectious disease standards.”

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To read more about Chairman Scott’s work to reverse this dangerous proposal, click here.

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