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WASHINGTON, DC -- U.S. Representatives George Miller (D-CA), Major Owens (D-NY), and Hilda Solis (D-CA) today urged U.S. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao to issue emergency safety rules for workers at companies that use a chemical for artificial food flavoring linked to a severe, irreversible lung disease that has sickened at least 200 workers nationwide in recent years and killed at least three.
The chemical, diacetyl, is used to create artificial butter flavoring for a range of consumer food products, from popcorn to candy to frozen food. The National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, a federal agency that conducts research to prevent work-related sickness and injury, has concluded that exposure to diacetyl in the workplace can lead to bronchiolitis obliterans, a disease that can destroy the lungs even of a young and healthy worker and that cannot be reversed. Yet the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has failed to issue new rules that could prevent harmful exposure to diacetyl in the workplace.
“This is a frightening disease that has sickened or killed workers from coast to coast,” said Miller, the senior Democrat on the House Education and the Workforce Committee. “Under the Bush administration, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has knowingly refused to use its authority to crack down on this problem in food manufacturing plants all over the country. For the sake of these workers, it is time for that history of neglect to be reversed, and fast.”
“OSHA’s refusal to regulate diacetyl is costing some workers their lungs and their lives. Secretary Chao must intervene at once to stop these preventable deaths,” said Owens, the senior Democrat on the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections.
“OSHA’s failure to regulate the flavorings industry has caused workers in my district and around the nation to develop a debilitating lung disease. It is long overdue for Secretary Chao to fulfill her legal and moral responsibility to protect these workers from this terrible, but preventable illness, by taking emergency steps to regulate diacetyl,” said Solis. “I urge swift action to protect the health of workers across this country.”
Cases of bronchiolitis obliterans have appeared at plants throughout the country – from California to New Jersey – where diacetyl is used to make butter flavoring or where butter flavoring is used to make consumer food products, like microwave popcorn. At one plant in Missouri, four workers were put on the list for lung transplants after being exposed to diacetyl.
In a letter to Chao today, the House lawmakers asked her to immediately issue emergency rules to limit diacetyl exposure among workers. The letter cites a number of NIOSH recommendations for accomplishing this goal, including the substitution of less toxic ingredients, the use of appropriate protective respirators, and the establishment of rigorous health monitoring programs for workers.
The letter to Chao is below. To view a PDF copy of the letter, click here.
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August 2, 2006
The Honorable Elaine Chao, Secretary
The U.S. Department of Labor
200 Constitution Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20210
Dear Secretary Chao:
It is imperative that you take immediate steps to protect U.S. workers from bronchiolitis obliterans, a progressive and often fatal lung disease caused by occupational exposure to diacetyl, a synthetic form of butter flavoring, by issuing an Emergency Temporary Standard in accordance with section 655 (c) of the OSH Act.
Recent investigative reports in the Sacramento Bee and the Baltimore Sun documented serious outbreaks of bronchiolitis obliterans in recent years. In 2004, the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) issued an official alert about the connection between workplace exposure to diacetyl and irreversible lung disease. Despite these NIOSH warnings, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has refused to take corrective action. When asked about this, OSHA spokesperson Kate Dugan responded: “We cannot regulate every hazard in every industry. That would be an impossible task.” OSHA’s refusal to act signifies a clear abdication of its statutory responsibilities under the Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act, 29 USC § 651 et seq.
Immediate action is essential to prevent new outbreaks of bronchiolitis obliterans and safeguard workers in a wide range of plants that manufacture or use synthetic butter flavoring. They include businesses that use synthetic diacetyl to manufacture butter flavoring as well as those that use the manufactured flavoring in consumer products, including microwave popcorn, baked goods, candy, frozen foods and other products.
In 2000, NIOSH was alerted by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services to a bronchiolitis obliterans outbreak among former workers of a microwave popcorn factory in Jasper, Missouri. The Missouri DHSS was first informed of this rash of cases by an astute local physician who suspected that the patients he was seeing had contracted the debilitating lung disease in the workplace. After intensive research, NIOSH scientists concluded that important respiratory protections were needed to prevent new cases of bronchiolitis obliterans. NIOSH scientists subsequently published their findings about flavorings-related lung disease in agency reports and peer-reviewed medical journals.
In turn, NIOSH officials briefed their counterparts in OSHA and also sent formal alerts to employers and medical professionals. Very recently, NIOSH updated its web-page, adding an alert in Spanish for Latino workers in flavoring plants as well as a user-friendly icon whereby workers, occupational health practitioners and members of the general public can examine all the agency publications on this issue.
It is alarming that at least 200 workers in worksites from California to New Jersey have contracted this severe disease. Yet as reported in the Baltimore Sun, OSHA spokespersons have stated the agency has already done all it will do about harmful exposure to diacetyl. OSHA’s reputed action has been to “inform” its inspectors that workers in plants manufacturing artificial flavorings may be at risk of “over-exposure to vapors.” However, according to the Sun, four out of five OSHA compliance inspectors in different regions said they had never been alerted to any new inspection directives for flavoring plants.
On the OSHA website as of July 26, 2006, diacetyl is only referred to in a short technical paper that reviews NIOSH sampling and analytical methods. Moreover, the only reference to cases of severe lung disease triggered by exposure to this synthetic butter flavoring is as follows: “Presently some 138 plants manufacturing butter flavor popcorn employing some 3400 employee[s] may be at risk of contacting lung related illness.” This reference ignores the risks of diacetyl exposures in the baking, candy, frozen food and other food industries.
The 2004 NIOSH alert outlined a robust series of recommendations for employers and workers in plants that manufacture or use flavorings. To minimize occupational exposure to any hazardous flavorings, NIOSH urged employers to: (1) substitute less toxic ingredients for hazardous flavorings, (2) use engineering controls such as closed production systems, (3) use administrative controls that isolate and restrict access to areas where flavorings are handled, (4) educate management and workers about the risks of hazardous exposures, (5) provide appropriate personal protective equipment including NIOSH-certified half-mask, negative-pressure respirators, (6) monitor all exposures through routine air sampling, and to (7) establish a comprehensive health monitoring program for workers which would include periodic testing of lung function as well as rigorous surveillance and disease reporting procedures.
The above-cited recommendations reflect the grave health consequences NIOSH scientists discovered when investigating clusters of cases where workers had been exposed to diacetyl. In 2004, NIOSH reported that by the time workers at the Jasper popcorn plant had been referred to a pulmonary specialist, more than half were immediately placed on lung transplant lists. In other plants, a number of workers had such severe disease they were too ill to qualify for a lung transplant. In press accounts, the case of a worker in his mid-twenties who had contracted bronchiolitis obliterans as a result of diacetyl exposure was described in graphic detail. This former worker, hooked up around the clock to an oxygen tank, had become too weak to walk from his bedroom to the bathroom. At least three workers have died from this irreversible lung disease.
To summarize, NIOSH has already documented the deadly consequences of occupational exposure to synthetic diacetyl and alerted OSHA to this urgent matter. OSHA refuses to act upon the NIOSH alerts and health hazard evaluations of diacetyl. Such inaction signifies a clear disregard for OSHA’s statutory responsibilities.
It is therefore incumbent upon you to issue an Emergency Temporary Standard to limit workplace exposure to artificial diacetyl. Given the urgency of this matter, we request a response from you within seven (7) days regarding your immediate plan of action.
Sincerely,
Rep. George Miller Rep. Major R. Owens
Senior Democratic Member Ranking Democratic Member
Committee on Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Workforce Protections
Rep. Hilda Solis
Democratic Member
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