The American Hospital Association, American Medical Association and American Nurses Association issued a joint statement Tuesday backing recent guidance issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention aimed at stopping the spread of Ebola.
OSHA has drafted the framework for an envisioned rule to help stop the spread of infectious diseases in health care work settings, putting a conceptual blueprint of the rule before small business advocates in a required next step of trying to advance the rule, which would in OSHA's eyes include a written infection control plan and qualified personnel within hospitals to oversee disease control efforts on behalf of workers.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is weighing competing comments on improving its facility security program, with industry groups citing an "inherent conflict" with Environmental Protection Agency information-sharing requirements and urging changes to DHS' inspection protocols, while labor and community groups are calling for greater coordination with other federal programs, including OSHA inspections.
OSHA has produced new guidelines in response to Ebola saying workers cleaning or decontaminating for Ebola must use at a “minimum” NIOSH-approved, fit-tested N95 respirators in situations where there could be exposure to the deadly virus through a bio-aerosol, such as could occur from spraying liquids or air during cleaning.
OSHA is “determined” to finalize new regulations before the end of the Obama administration that lower exposure limits and put practices in place to control crystalline silica dust, agency chief David Michaels said Monday.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued sweeping new guidelines for health care workers to prevent the spread of Ebola that recommend standard use of N95 or air-purifying respirators near Ebola, as opposed to earlier guidance suggesting such high-end respirators are only needed during aerosol-generating procedures.
Industrial health experts are urgently calling on OSHA, and also taking their case directly to the White House, to move forward as rapidly as possible on a rulemaking to tackle infectious diseases in health care settings -- pressure that follows close on the heels of at least two U.S. health workers testing positive for the Ebola virus.
Senate Appropriations Chair Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) announced a full committee hearing Nov. 6 in Washington on on the U.S. government response to the Ebola outbreak. The Senate hearing follows a similar probe last week by the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
On the House side, the Oversight Committee will hold a hearing Friday (Oct. 24), despite the congressional recess, examining whether the government is adequately training and equipping American health care workers and military personnel who treat patients infected with the deadly virus.
Mikulski's move to get the appropriations panel more directly involved in understanding the government-wide response comes shortly after Congress approved a spending package that includes devoting funds at the behest of the Obama administration to fighting the spread of Ebola, particularly in West Africa (see related document).
The National Nurses Union said the president's decision to tap a White House Ebola czar falls short unless the administration gives the czar power to cut off Medicare and Medicaid funds at hospitals that don't meet the highest uniform, national workplace safety standards.
Worldwide concern over outbreaks of Ebola disease has hit home in the U.S. health care sector as a nurse in Dallas who cared for a now-deceased patient with the virus has contracted the disease, despite use of full personal protective equipment (PPE), putting new pressure on employers to institute comprehensive infection control programs that include site-specific training of employees.