| May 1998 | Volume 3 | Issue 1 |
| Canada
site of NIFS Summer Conference
Delaware in '99? Delaware has offered to host the 1999 NIFS Summer Conference. The first
state in the U.S., Delaware offers opportunities to visit a variety of
historic sites. Agricultureis the No. 1 industry in Delaware.
|
What is the impact of noise exposure
on the farm? What's the best way to access agricultural safety information
on the Internet? How do you convince farmers to use respiratory protection?
These are just a few of the dozens of topics that will be explored at the upcoming 1998 National Institute for Farm Safety (NIFS) Summer Conference. The conference -- being held in Canada for only the third time in 50-plus years -- will be June 21-June 25 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in downtown Winnipeg, Manitoba. The conference, open to anyone interested in agricultural safety and health issues, promises an opportunity to learn more about Canadian agriculture and network with farm safety and health professionals from across Canada and the U.S. Here are some of the highlights: * a pre-conference visit to the Museum of Man and Nature, which will include a photo exhibit of children at work around the world * a keynote speech by Dr. Robert Conn of The Smart Risk Foundation on recognizing, assessing and choosing behaviors that will keep youth from becoming injured * visits to a Hutterite Colony and a Christmas tree and strawberry farm to view agricultural health and safety strategies at work. * oral presentations on such topics as worker health and hazard issues, ATVs, safety and health resources, and the status of the North American Guidelines for Children's Agricultural Tasks project The conference will also include two professional improvement sessions -- one on audiometrics in agriculture (noise exposure, hearing testing and control methods) and the other on accessing farm safety information on the Internet. Participants will also have an opportunity to view numerous posters and educational displays on critical farm safety and health issues. Meet other Canadians The Canadian Coalition for Agricultural Safety and Rural
Health has scheduled its semi-annual meeting to coincide with the NIFS
event, providing attendees at both meetings with additional networking
opportunities.
http://www.gov.mb.ca/labour/safety/nifsconf.html (As of 8/1/2003 this link doesn't exist) |
| New National Ag Safety Database available | Looking for a comprehensive source of information on health,
safety and injury prevention in agriculture? The National Institute for
Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) recently announced the availability
of the new National Ag Safety Database (NASD '97) on CD-ROM and the World
Wide Web.
The database contains more than 2,000 agricultural safety and health publications from around the country. Included are OSHA and EPA standards, a database of abstracts and ordering information for more than 1,000 agricultural safety-related videos, ready-to-use slide show style presentations and other training programs, and a NIOSH bibliography that includes abstracts for more than 500 scientific publications. The materials on NASD are arranged by subject areas such as topic, state, videos, Spanish language materials, and journal abstracts. Those with Internet access can view NASD from this web site: |
| Respirator
changes affect farm owners By Becky Brown
|
Recent changes in
respiratory standards have made choosing a respirator even more of a challenge
for farm owners. NIOSH (the National Institute for Occupational Safety
and Health) revised its testing and certification procedures for dust/mist
type respirators. This affects the type of particulate respirators (those
used for dusts, mists and fumes) and pre-filters that farmers must choose.
How should a farmer choose a filter type?
Why are there different filter efficiencies?
How do these changes affect PAPRs
What if a farmer has no idea if his or her pesticides are oil-based?
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| Greetings from the land of the humbled, fighting
Blue Hens!
During my term as your president, I hope to see NIFS make
a smooth transition in management style and meeting format and become a
more viable organization -- sensitive and responsive to the professional
development needs of its members. We must remain aware of factors that
determine the health of our organization and strive to develop, nurture
and prioritize those areas.
I ask that each member and friend of NIFS help me achieve these tangible goals in the next few months:
Ronald C. Jester,NIFS President |
| Responding to a farm emergency | If you found a friend, neighbor
or family member pinned underneath a tractor or entangled in a piece of
farm equipment, would you know what to do? Would you be able to react appropriately
and quickly enough to save the person's life?
A new educational program, First-on-the-Scene for Farm Families, is designed to help farm family members and farmworkers know exactly what to do if they are the first ones to respond to a farm emergency. The program was developed by two NIFS members, Penn State University Extension Safety Specialist Dennis Murphy and FARMEDIC* National Training Center Executive Director Dave Hill. "Each year, many farmers and farmworkers are involved in serious accidents on the farm. Their survival often depends on the individuals -- usually co-workers or family members -- who find them and must care for them until emergency personnel arrive," Murphy says. "If you're the first person to find a victim, you need to make decisions and take actions in a logical order. If you don't, you may cause further injury to the person or you may risk injury or death yourself," he adds. First-on-the-Scene for Farm Families takes participants through various real-life accident scenarios, then guides them to reach the proper response on their own. Presentations typically run from 90 minutes to two hours. Available topics include: tractor overturns, PTO entanglements, machinery entanglements, grain bin emergencies, silo emergencies, manure storage emergencies, chemical emergencies, electrical emergencies, and reporting farm accidents. The FARMEDIC* National Training Center will train instructors in local areas to present the programs. For more information, call 800/437-6010. * Trademark |
| Rural
mailboxes an unrecognized safety risk
|
An estimated 70 to 100 people in
the United States die each year in motor vehicle collisions with rural
mailboxes.Yet many of these deaths could be avoided by following certain
guidelines when installing and decorating rural mailboxes.
The National Institute for Farm Safety, Inc. recently passed a resolution in support of the recommendations contained in the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials' (AASHTO) 1994 publication, A Guide for Erecting Mailboxes on Highways. AASHTO, which notes there are aspects of individual and group mailboxes that can "turn a single mailbox installation into a lethal roadside obstacle," has the following tips for rural mailbox installations: 1. Use only Postmaster-approved mailboxes made of light sheet metal or plastic. 2. Locate the mailbox away from traffic so the mail delivery vehicle can stop completely out of the flow of traffic. 3. Use a support only strong enough to hold the mailbox. An ordinary 4 inch x 4 inch wood post or a round metal pipe 1 and one-half inches to 2 inches in diameter anchored in the ground no more than two feet is recommended. 4. Mailbox-to-post attachments should prevent the box from coming loose from the post if struck by a motor vehicle. 5. Use individual mounting posts rather than a heavy horizontal support for multiple mailbox mountings. 6. Never mark mailboxes with reflective materials that can mislead or confuse road users. It may be illegal in your state to mark your mailbox with a slow-moving vehicle (SMV) emblem. Rural residents can contact their Postmasters for specific installation details. |
| Upcoming Events | |
| May 9-15, 1998:
American Industrial Hygiene Conference & Exposition Atlanta, Georgia May 17-20, 1998:
June 21-22, 1998:
June 21-25, 1998:
Oct. 25-30, 1998:
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| NIOSH funds childhood injury prevention projects | |
| Each year, an estimated 100,000 children in the United
States sustain injuries associated with production agriculture (the National
Committee for Childhood Agricultural Injury Prevention, Children and Agriculture:
Opportunities for Safety and Health, 1996). Children are exposed to agricultural
hazards not only by virtue of work, but also by living in or visiting these
work environments.
In 1996, the National Committee for Childhood Agricultural Injury Prevention proposed a national action plan aimed at reducing agriculture-related childhood injuries. NIOSH, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, received a $5 million appropriation from Congress to begin implementing the recommendations in the plan. Since that time, NIOSH has awarded a number of childhood agricultural injury prevention grants. It has also funded a new National Children's Center for Agricultural Injury Prevention under a cooperative agreement with the National Farm Medicine Center. The new center will coordinate and evaluate childhood agricultural injury prevention programs, help identify potential interventions to protect children from agricultural hazards, and provide professional training, technical assistance, public education and outreach. The following 16 projects were awarded NIOSH Childhood Agricultural Injury Prevention Research Grants late last summer: |
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| Risk Factors for Injury Among
Migrant and Seasonal Farmworker Children -
Harlan E. Amandus, Ph.D., Battelle Memorial Institute Health and Safety Risks to Children of Migrant Farmworkers - Doris P. Slesinger, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin College of Agricultural & Life Sciences Childhood Health Outcomes in A Rural Cohort - James A. Merchant, M.D., University of Iowa Childhood Injuries in Washington State Agriculture - Bruce Alexander, Ph.D., University of Washington Department of Environmental Health Etiology and Consequences of Injuries Among Children in Farm Households: A Regional Rural Injury Study - Susan Goodwin Gerberich, Ph.D., University of Minnesota School of Public Health The Health of Children Hired to Work on U.S. Farms - Don Villarejo, Ph.D., California Institute for Rural Studies Health Outcomes in Adolescent Minority Farmworkers - Linda A. McCauley, Ph.D., Oregon Health Sciences University Outcomes of Agricultural Injury to Children in Missouri - Garland H. Land, M.P.H., Missouri Department of Health Economic and Psychosocial Impacts of Youth Farm Injury - John R. Schmelzer, Ph.D., Marshfield Medical Research and Education Foundation Ag Disability Awareness and Risk Education - Deborah B. Reed, Ph.D., University of Kentucky Enhancing Agricultural Safety & Health Through Education - David L. Parker, M.D., Minnesota Department of Health Wisconsin Childhood Agricultural Safety and Health Intervention - Larry J. Chapman, Ph.D. Tractor Safety Certification: A Multi-Curricula Approach - Roger L. Tormoehlen, Ph.D., Purdue University Youth Teaching Youth: Are TASK Teens Ready to Teach - Robert Edward Petrea, Ph.D., University of Illinois Evaluating Ohio's Tractor Certification Program: Traditional and Novel Approaches - J.R. Wilkins III, Dr.P.H.,Ohio State University School of Public Health School-Based Agricultural Injury and Illness Prevention - Frances C. Henderson, Ed.D., Alcorn State University |
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