Clearing The Air

When does an issue rise to a level of health hazard requiring government action?

I think if someone is going to goto lawmakers and claim we need a law for x,y, or z because x,y, or z is a health hazard. Then the initial hurdle ought to be to first prove that x,y, or z is a health hazard. And OSHA standards ought to be the gauge if the argument is that we need to protect employees' health....because OSHA is the agency that protects employee health regarding every potentially hazardous workplace situation.

If actual x,y, or z levels are below OSHA guidelines ie. safer than OSHA guidelines, then no organization has the right to bring that particular issue before lawmakers to demand an ordinance or legislation.

And in the case of secondhand smoke the ALA, ACS, AHA, AMA, ANR, ASH, etc. etc. and anyone else that recieved Nicoderm funding thru RWJF would be driven out of city hall & state capitols for wasting lawmakers' time on an issue which clearly does not rise to health hazard levels.....and only serves to financially benefit the pharmaceutical nicotine industry which funded such efforts. SLP/OSHA data proved secondhand smoke conentrations indoors are 500-15 times safer than OSHA regulations.

Columnist Craig Westover has another well thought out criteria for determining when an issue rises to a level of health hazard which then requires government action....but I will have to search for that later.

posted by marcus aurelius @ 1:49 PM