NOTE: This document is provided for historical purposes only.
Greg Watchman, Deputy Assistant Secretary for OSHA
MS. TAYLOR: Next, I'd like to introduce Gregory Watchman, who is currently the Deputy Assistant Secretary for OSHA. As some of you may have heard, Joe Dear has accepted a position outside of the Agency. This is his last week with the Agency. So as of next week, Greg Watchman will be our Acting Assistant Secretary. He was asked by Secretary Reich to fill that post temporarily.
As Deputy Assistant Secretary, Mr. Watchman has been responsible for regulatory, policy, safety, and health standards, legislative, and interagency affairs. Previously, Mr. Watchman served as chief labor counsel to the Subcommittee on Labor with the United States Senate Committee on Labor and Human Resources.
Please welcome Mr. Watchman.
MR. WATCHMAN: Thank you, Sandy.
Good morning. It's great to see so many people here. I was really disappointed that we only had 1000 people coming to this conference in the dead of winter in Chicago, Illinois.
It is wonderful to see all of you here, and I know that you share our commitment to try to address the problem of musculoskeletal disorders.
First, I do want to express Joe Dear's deep regrets at not being here. As Sandy has told you, Joe received a wonderful offer from the Governor-Elect of Washington State to be that governor's chief of staff. He's the first person brought on board, and it gives Joe and his family an opportunity to move back to their home in Washington State.
He is, though, very committed to the issue of ergonomics, was very strongly behind this conference, and we will continue his efforts as we move forward in the next few months.
This conference reflects the best of President Clinton's government reinvention effort. It reflects a partnership between workers and employers, safety and health professionals and academics, and the government, to work together to find solutions to this very serious workplace health problem.
I want to thank Linda and the NIOSH staff that have helped with this conference, as well as the OSHA staff -- in particular Margo Daniel, Gary Orr, Jennifer Silk, and Mark Kitzmiller -- for all of their many hours of effort to put this together.
I also want to thank the cosponsors, including the National Safety Council, ASSE, AIHA, and many others, as Linda noted, who helped to put this event together.
Mostly, I want to thank you all as participants for taking time out of your busy schedules. I'm sure you have a lot going on at your jobs, coming back from the holidays, and trying to get back to work. This is an important issue, and I really appreciate you coming and recognizing the importance of it.
The conference also reflects the President's and the Vice President's recognition that government doesn't always have all the answers to the problems of our society. The President and the Vice President recognize that there are times when government should listen rather than telling people exactly what to do.
This is one of those times, when we are here for the next two days, to hear what all of you are doing, to recognize the problem of musculoskeletal disorders in the workplace and to find effective solutions to it.
We are going to hear a wide range of case studies over the next two days. We are going to hear case studies ranging from assembling automobiles to disassembling chickens, from handling patients to handling packages; from UAW to University of California, from US West to Unite, from 3M to GM.
We are going to hear a very broad range of studies focusing on workplaces, small and large, in many different industries, many different industrial processes, and many different occupations.
I'm very excited by this turnout of 1,000 people for this conference. It certainly reflects the commitment that all of you have to this issue, but it also has a very serious side to it. It reflects the nature of the problem and the scope of the problem.
We are here because this is America's biggest workplace health problem.
We are here because every year hundreds of thousands of American workers suffer repetitive stress injuries and other types of musculoskeletal disorders. Currently, these account for one in every four lost worktime injuries on the job. That's a staggering number.
These are conditions that arise from a mismatch between the physical demands of a job and the physical limitations of the human body. As we know, there are major risk factors, such as repetitive motion, force, awkward posture, and heavy lifting that are the primary causes of musculoskeletal disorders.
Now, how serious is this problem? In the last Congress, it was said on the House floor that no one ever died from ergonomics, and that may be true. But we also know that when workers suffer from musculoskeletal disorders, they have severe pain, they lose time at work, they often have extended disability and sometimes even permanent disability.
It doesn't just prevent a worker from doing his or her job. It also affects their ability to perform basic life functions, like driving, writing, or brushing their teeth, or even lifting a child.
Let me give you an example.
Betty was a worker at a chicken processing plant in Magnolia, Mississippi. She spent seven years separating chicken filets from the bone. She performed this task 18 times a minute for hours at a time without a break. She complained about the pain in her arms and her wrists, but her supervisors took no action to help her situation.
Ultimately, she was diagnosed as having torn rotator cuffs. She had to undergo two surgeries, and she was transferred to light duty work responsibilities, and ultimately terminated from her job.
As I said, there are hundreds of thousands of American workers who are suffering these kinds of consequences every single year in this country, and I'm glad to see you all here, to take responsibility, to try to do something about this problem.
We are also here because these disorders are causing a tremendous cost to our society and to our economy. We estimate that musculoskeletal disorders cost up to $20 billion a year just in workers' compensation costs alone. That's one in every three dollars of workers' compensation costs.
We estimate several times that figure for indirect expenses such as employee turnover, training, et cetera.
So we know this is a problem in many different industries, many different processes, many different occupations. But the most important reason we are here for the next two days is that we know that most of these incidents are preventable.
We are here because all of you -- corporate representatives, worker representatives, safety and health professionals, government workers, and academics -- are deeply concerned about this problem. We are here because you've learned through your own experiences that there are effective solutions that are economically and technologically feasible, that can often be implemented at low cost and that, in many cases, actually save employers money while, at the same time, achieving the goal of reducing repetitive stress injuries and other musculoskeletal disorders.
I look forward to hearing the stories in the next two days and to moving forward with you as we work to find these solutions.
Let me take a minute to talk about OSHA's own response to this problem.
The President's May 1995 New OSHA Initiative includes three themes.
One is to offer responsible employers a choice between partnership with the Agency and traditional enforcement.
A second theme is to instill common sense in our regulatory activities and our enforcement activities.
A third theme is to focus on results and improving worker safety and health, rather than red tape.
These themes are all reflected in this conference and in the Agency's response to the problem of musculoskeletal disorders.
First: For responsible employers, many of you are here today. For responsible employers who need help, we are offering outreach and education through events like this conference.
Second: We are offering compliance assistance materials, such as the technical assistance manual we are currently putting together, and we will make that available on the Internet and through trade associations.
Third: Through targeted training grants we will help workers and employers learn more about the nature of this problem and the solutions that are available.
Fourth: We offer free consultation visits through our state- run consultation programs in all 50 states to help, small and medium-sized companies, deal with this problem.
On the second theme of common sense, we are reserving the regulatory and enforcement actions for areas in which the problem is the worst and where the solutions are known. We want to use consensus-based approaches to these activities whenever possible and develop rules that are flexible and are consistent with common sense.
Lastly, we are focusing on results. That's why we're here today and tomorrow, to hear the effective solutions that you have developed in your own workplaces that are not only achieving real reductions in injury and illness in the workplace, but are also saving employers money.
Again, I look forward very much to working with you, hearing these experiences over the next two days, and moving forward together with you to address this problem.
Thank you.
MS. TAYLOR: Thank you.
