The UK’s standard setting system for hazardous substances frequently makes setting tighter standards difficult or impossible, a feature in Hazards magazine warns. It warns chemicals at work can be the one thing at work where you always get more than you bargained for.  The article says “three things stand in the way of better standards: The current protocols for standard setting; bureaucratic inertia; and, sometimes, an industry veto on potentially costly controls.” It cites as an example the case of methylene chloride (also known as dichloromethane).  “In 1998, the US safety enforcement agency agreed a more stringent exposure level for methylene chloride, one quarter the current UK limit. Getting exposures down to the level was not a problem – the US solvent industry association was party to the agreement that ushered in the new standard. Over here, in July 1999, HSE issued a consultative document proposing not only that the existing lax UK exposure level be retained, but it should also be downgraded from a binding MEL [maximum exposure limit] to a less stringent OES [occupational exposure standard].” In 2014 the UK was the only EU government to apply for a derogation from the blanket Europe-wide ban on use of the chemical as a paint stripper. It claimed this was needed for specialist work on historic buildings. No such request was made by other governments, which have their share of historic buildings too.

Unhealthy standards: UK review of chemical exposure limits – time for some level thinking, Hazards, number 67, July-September 1999 [not online].

Proposals for maximum exposure limits, occupational exposure standards and biological monitoring guidance values, CD150/99, HSE, July 1999 [not online].

This paper notes: “One fact remains abundantly clear: for every known human carcinogen that has been tested adequately in laboratory animals, the findings of carcinogenicity are concordant.” According to Watterson (2014): “In this major paper, Huff looks at the predictive value of animal studies and examines long-term carcinogenesis bioassays used to identify human carcinogens and their drawbacks. The importance of mixtures and a host of factors, including occupational exposures to cancer etiology, are discussed: though difficult such factors could be explored experimentally. The higher public health risks from false negatives are noted.”

James Huff.  Long-term chemical carcinogenesis bioassays predict human cancer hazards: Issues, controversies, and uncertainties, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, volume 895, pages 56-79, 1999.

The Industrial Injuries Advisory Council considered ‘diseases induced by ionising and non-ionising radiation’ and made a number of recommendations that were accepted by government.  IIAC said that the diseases prescribed in relation to ionising radiation should be leukaemia, and cancers of the bone, female breast, testis and thyroid. It added that each of these cancers should only be prescribed for doses of ionising radiation sufficient to double the risk of its occurrence. IIAC also recommend that no form of skin cancer should be prescribed in relation to ultraviolet radiation. The changes took effect in July 2000.

Diseases induced by Ionising and Non-Ionising Radiation, Cm 4280, IIAC, March 1999 [pre-2000 IIAC papers are not available online].

A 1999 paper in the British Journal of Cancer concluded trends in asbestos-related mesothelioma deaths indicated over a quarter of a million men in western Europe will die of this cancer alone over the following 35 years. The paper predicted deaths from the disease among men in Western Europe would almost double form 5,000 in 1998 to about 9,000 in 2018. The research focused on six countries – Britain, Italy, France, The Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland. The paper indicated there would be one asbestos-related lung cancer death for every mesothelioma death, pushing the asbestos toll in Western Europe to half a million in the following 35 years. The estimate was contested in Hazards magazine, which said other experts say there could be up to three lung cancer deaths related to asbestos for every mesothelioma death – which would bring the toll over the next generation to 1 million needless deaths.

J Peto and others. The European mesothelioma epidemic, British Journal of Cancer, volume 79, number 3/4, page 666-672, 1999.

One million needless deaths, Hazards, number 65, January-March 1999 [not online].

An investigation of Staffordshire pottery workers found that the industry has a detectable lung cancer risk associated with exposure to crystalline silica. Researchers investigated causes of death among men who had worked in the Staffordshire potteries at some time between 1929 and 1992. They found this group had more lung cancer deaths compared to the national population, or the local male population of Stoke-on-Trent. Lung cancer incidence was associated with particular processes with high levels of exposure to silica. The paper concluded: “The association between risk of lung cancer and quantitative estimates of silica exposure supports the SMR [standardised mortality ratio] analysis and implies that crystalline silica may well be a human carcinogen.” In 1996, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) rated silica as a group 1 human carcinogen. In 2014, HSE was still receiving criticism for its inaction on this occupational cancer risk.

NM Cherry and others. Crystalline silica and risk of lung cancer in the potteries, Occupational and Environmental Medicine, volume 55, pages 779-785, 1998.

UK workers were afforded far worse protection from the highly hazardous and cancer linked solvent methylene chloride (dichloromethane) than their US counterparts. Tighter standard were introduced in the US after a concerted 13-year union campaign. US regulator OSHA introduced a 25 parts per million (ppm) based on the assumption (subsequently proven) that methylene chloride may cause cancer in humans. In January 1998, autoworkers’ union UAW sued OSHA in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, seeking stronger protection for methylene chloride exposed workers. An industry group, the Halogenated Solvents Industry, also sued OSHA, objecting to the cost of the new standard. Soon after the lawsuits were filed, the UAW sought to develop with industry a mutually agreeable standard that would make it possible to end the litigation against OSHA. The resulting settlement was adopted by OSHA. The UK limit at the time was 100ppm, four times higher than the new US standard. HSE in 1998 reviewed its standard, but recommended not only a standstill standard, but a switch from a more binding Maximum Exposure Limit (MEL) to a less strict Occupational Exposure Standard (OES).

HSE’s poor solvent plan, Hazards, number 64, October-December 1998 [not online].

Dichloromethane – Exposure assessment document, EH74/1, HSE, August 1998.

In 1977 Hazards warned that a Derbyshire PVC factory could have put workers at risk of developing cancer at the end of the century. It took local trade union research in 1998 to confirm the factory’s former workforce has been decimated by disease.

Hazards 64, October-December 1998.

Hazards reported that the UK government was in 1998 “edging nervously” towards an asbestos ban. This process was been driven by plans in the European Union to introduce a cross community ban. However, Hazards obtained and publicised evidence showing that the European Commission scientific committee considering the ban proposal had been heavily influenced by a supposedly independent paper that had infact been placed by asbestos industry interests, via Canada’s embassy in Italy. This led to a delay in UK government plans to approve asbestos prohibition regulations. It was 1999 before the European Commission agreed a ban should be implemented EU wide by January 2005. A UK ban took effect in November 1999.

Do or die time for asbestos trade, Hazards, number 62, April-June 1998 [not online].

A report in Hazards magazine claimed industrial chemicals are poorly controlled as a result of inaction or opposition to controls by regulators and industry. The report cites international evidence, and highlights the Prevent Cancer Campaign launched by the Canadian union CAW (now Unifor) in 1997. It quotes CAW’s then national health and safety director Cathy Walker: “We need reductions in the allowable exposure limits which have proven to be so inadequate. We need zero tolerance for exposures to carcinogens. Government must compel industry to replace carcinogens with non-toxic substances by stringent regulations and tough enforcement.” She said chemicals should not be given the benefit of the doubt. “Many questions still have to be answered. But we need not wait until every ‘i’ is dotted to being taking defensive action.”

Industrial genocide: Why industry defends the use of cancer causing chemicals in the workplace, Hazards, number 62, April-June 1998 [not online]. Archive of CAW prevent cancer campaign materials.

High benzene exposures have been found in car mechanics and road tanker drivers. The French study involved measuring levels of the established human carcinogen in the air throughout the working day for both occupations. Tanker drivers experienced the higher exposures, with some concentrations as high as 7.2 parts per million (ppm), higher than the then 5 ppm exposure limit in force in France and the UK (subsequently cut to 1 ppm). Car mechanics faced high exposures when undertaking tasks including dismantling petrol filters and tuning and repairing carburettors. The paper called for “individual and collective safety measures should be imposed in both occupations.” The findings suggest excesses of related cancers like leukaemia might be expected in these occupations after a latency period, with the related cancers emerging sometime around or after 2020.

B Javelaud and others. Benzene exposure in car mechanics and road tanker drivers, International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health, volume 71, pages 277-283, 1998.