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OSHA Kills Tuberculosis Standard

The Bush administration has continued its assault on work-place safety. OSHA ended 2003 by withdrawing its proposed rule to prevent occupational exposure to tuberculosis, a regulation that was 10 years in the making. Since 1993, AFSCME has led a coalition of unions that has urged OSHA to require that employers institute recognized infection-control practices aimed at preventing TB.

John Henshaw, Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health, gave weak and unconvincing reasons for withdrawing the proposed rule. He pointed to a decline in the total number of tuberculosis cases in the United States and claimed that health care facilities were already following guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

While it is true that total cases have been dropping in recent years, the decline has not been uniform. CDC's most recently published data show the number of TB cases in 2002 either remained the same or increased in 16 states. As for compliance with CDC guidelines, the reality is that the guidelines are voluntary and nurses and other health care workers are all too familiar with incomplete and inconsistent implementation of CDC's unenforceable recommendations.

OSHA's lack of standards has implications beyond TB. The proposed rule would have required infection control measures that would also protect health care workers from SARS and other diseases spread through the air.

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