In August 2000, the UK national union body TUC called on trade unions to be on the lookout for new workplace diseases .In a special TUC-backed ‘Surveying the damage’ report in the workers’ health journal Hazards, union safety reps were urged to ask their workmates what health problems they are experiencing, so that detailed research can identify previously hidden occupational diseases. As part of the plan, TUC training was to be provided for safety reps on techniques such as “body mapping”. TUC highlighted the findings of a worker-based study into the effects of the chemical vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) carried out with financial support from the TUC and a number of organisations in North Derbyshire. It said it “believes that many other diseases caused by work, including large numbers of cancers, could currently be being wrongly classified as ‘lifestyle’ diseases.”

TUC news release, 15 August, 2000. Surveying the damage: A guide to do-it-yourself health and safety research, Hazards, number 71, July-September 2000.