"In hearings on a draft rule to prevent heat-related illness in millions of vulnerable U.S. workers, top health and safety experts explain why relying on employers to “do the right thing” costs lives."
"Juanita Constible has analyzed state workplace heat standards across the United States for the Natural Resources Defense Council since 2018. But she first encountered heat stress as a wildlife biologist nearly 30 years ago, while spending long, hot days studying Canadian toads in a northeastern Alberta forest and nights sleeping in a stuffy tent.
On one particularly hot day Constible pushed herself too far, caught up in a workplace culture keen on toughing it out. She became so dehydrated and overheated she lost her way on trails she’d walked dozens of times before. Constible has no idea how long she spent wandering around before she stumbled upon her truck. But she’s certain that if she hadn’t made it to the air-conditioned cab, she wouldn’t be alive today.
She’d been trained to operate chainsaws, load all-terrain vehicles onto the back of a pickup truck and handle a bear encounter. But her employer provided no training on extreme heat, the hazard she encountered most often on the job.
“My story had a happy ending,” Constible, now senior climate and health advocate with NRDC, told staff with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration on Monday, during the final days of a public hearing on a federal heat standard proposed by the Biden administration last summer. “But too many untrained workers have not been so lucky.”"
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