Implementing workplace health programs and meeting OSHA compliance requirements will be the main topics of discussion at a Boston conference and a series of webinars on OSHA this week.

OSHA on Tuesday announced that it is seeking public comment on new efforts to reduce paperwork and reporting burdens on states that maintain their own occupational safety and health plans.

OSHA is planning to release complete reporting numbers and a full analysis of injury reporting for the past year following implementation of new requirements one year ago mandating that any severe on-the-job injury be reported within 24 hours.

The U.S. EPA has extended for a second time its deadline for public input on the agency's proposed rule strengthening protections for applicators of restricted use pesticides, granting a request from state regulators who have argued the rule would cause some states to overhaul programs and that more time is needed to review changes.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration will hold an informal public hearing on Feb. 29 on its proposed rule amending existing occupational exposure limits to beryllium and beryllium compounds.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is planning to strengthen its industrial facility accident prevention program with new requirements for facilities to face independent audits, conduct hazard analysis, and share information with emergency planners and the public, though industry representatives are urging the agency to limit costly new revisions, saying the current program is working.

Safety activists are urging White House officials to ensure that the Environmental Protection Agency issues a final industrial facility safety rule that includes a mandate to use inherently safer technologies (IST) and to issue it before President Obama leaves office, after learning from EPA that the agency will likely delay proposing the rule and not mandate IST.

Federal chemical safety investigators approve of several actions taken by petrochemical giant BP -- particularly efforts to ensure workers can lodge safety complaints without fear of retaliation -- in the wake of the deadly 2005 explosions at the company's refinery in Texas City, TX.

OSHA's clear signal that it hopes to finish a landmark new rule tackling worker exposures to crystalline silica dust by early next year -- the agency's new regulatory agenda pegs February as the target -- means the almost-inevitable legal and political battles over the rule's specifics could play out during the Obama administration, likely easing the path for OSHA to ensure it gets fully implemented.

A recently released NIOSH study indicates that health care workers continue to be exposed to hazardous “surgical smoke” -- a byproduct of thermal destruction of tissue during operations -- despite the existence of evidence-based practices and recommended controls available to protect them, the research agency said.