Posts Categorized: Health & Safety

The UFCW’s Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Office serves as resource to help locals keep our members safe and healthy in the workplace. As summer approaches, one of those resources includes material to help protect our members from the risk factors associated with exposure to heat and high humidity. This information has proven to be popular with our members, and all locals are encouraged to distribute this material and post it in breakrooms so that our members know their workplace rights when they’re exposed to extreme heat.

The material, which is available in English and Spanish, includes an outline of measures employers should take to protect workers from heat stress and heat-related illnesses, workplace safety strategies pertaining to hot weather, and sample heat emergency procedures.

All workers should have access to:
• Adequate amounts of drinking water.
• Regular rest breaks or rest periods in a cool area.
• Adequate air circulation through the use of air conditioning, fans and general ventilation.
• Education on the early signs of heat-related illness.
• Time to acclimatize to the heat. It takes about one week for the body to adjust to
working in the heat.

Hot weather safety strategies should include:
• Training all management and hourly employees with an emphasis on how to
recognize a medical emergency (heat stroke).
• Having a clearly written protocol on how to respond to a medical emergency.
• Training all management and hourly employees on workers’ right to access
drinking water as needed and the right to access bathrooms as needed.
• Monitoring particularly hot work areas and a plan in place for when the heat index approaches the extreme caution zone.

You can download the following material here:
• Hot Weather Advisory: Preventing Heat Stress at Work
• Workplace Strategies for Hot Weather Safety
• Sample Heat Emergency Procedures

If you have any questions or need more information, contact Robyn Robbins at rrobbins@ufcw.org or Fernando Tapia at ftapia@ufcw.org.

Our union has a proud history of keeping members safe and healthy at work. As we build on this legacy, the International’s Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Office is working with locals that represent members in the health care sector to further strengthen workplace safety.

Health care workers make incredible sacrifices every day to provide care for those in need and are more likely than other workers to face violence in the workplace. As more workers in the health care sector join our union family, protecting these hard-working women and men at work is a key priority.

Robyn Robbins, the director of the OSH Office, recently met with UFCW Local 1625 members who work at Lakeland Regional Medical Center in Lakeland, Fla., to help strengthen their workplace safety policies and procedures.

After meeting with workers and listening to their concerns, Robbins made recommendations to build on existing protections and find additional ways to keep our members safe. She recommended creating a joint labor-management workplace safety committee that includes workers and representatives from the local. She also suggested that the center review all its training policies and procedures to strengthen workplace safety and evaluate them for effectiveness.

UFCW Local 1625 President Ed Chambers put these recommendations into action and achieved positive results, including better training and education, improved reporting procedures, and improved communication by the hospital to the public about the importance of creating a safe work environment for caregivers, hospital staff, and the patients and families they serve.

“The reaction from our health care membership has been incredible since we took the lead in workplace safety,” said Chambers. “I’d like to thank the OSH Office for their help and direction. We knew the issues, and Robyn helped us design a remedy and our membership took the ball and ran with it. Now, we have posters throughout the hospital emphasizing the importance of a safe workplace with the UFCW logo on it.”

In addition to helping locals improve or create workplace violence prevention policies and programs, the OSH Office is also supporting the Workplace Violence Prevention for Health Care and Social Service Workers Act (H.R. 1309), which was introduced by Representative Joe Courtney (D-Conn.) to protect workers from violence on the job. This legislation would require the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to issue a clear standard for workplace safety and violence prevention, requiring employers in the health care and social service sectors to develop and implement a plan to protect their employees and keep them safe. For more information, contact Robyn Robbins at rrobbins@ufcw.org or Fernando Tapia at ftapia@ufcw.org.