Title: CHAIR’S MESSAGE

Author:

Section/SPIG: Occupational Health and Safety

Issue Date:

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David Kotelchuck, PHD, CIH
Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences Track
Hunter College
Business: (212) 481-4357
Fax: (212) 481-5260
<dkotelch@hunter.cuny.edu>

In a disturbing and perplexing move this past summer, Julie Gerberding, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, announced a major reorganization of the CDC into four major divisions or Coordinating Centers, each under a different Director, who will report to her. NIOSH, the largest agency within CDC, would be placed in the Coordinating Center for Environmental Health, Injury Prevention and Occupational Health. NIOSH Director John Howard would then report to Coordinating Center Director Henry Falk, also Director of the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), rather than directly to Gerberding. The plan is slated to go into effect on Oct. 1.

This demotion of NIOSH within the CDC bureaucracy, further moving it away from the independent agency status prescribed for it under the OSH Act of 1970, has united virtually the entire occupational safety and health community in opposition -–labor, management, academia, Democrat and Republican. A recent letter by the four living former directors of NIOSH said, "To downgrade NIOSH and blur its mission by combining key functions with other CDC programs will erode its independence and visibility and weaken the scientific contribution that has long benefited American workers and employers." Letters and expressions of opposition to this reorganization have come from the American Association of Occupational Health Nurses and the American Industrial Hygiene Association.

Members of your OHS Section have also been active in opposition to this reorganization. First, leadership of our Section was asked their opinions about the move, and all respondents opposed it. Then a letter of opposition to the move was circulated quickly among our Section members (see below), and sent to Secretary Tommy Thompson signed by nearly 100 health and safety professionals. We noted that the NIOSH move "is particularly troublesome given the serious erosion of worker safety and health protection under the Bush Administration through repeal of the ergonomics standard and withdrawal of standards to prevent TB in the workplace." (Because APHA’s Executive Council and senior staff had previously met with Gerberding and tentatively had given their blessing to the larger reorganization effort, the petitioners signed the letter as individuals, and the dialogue with our own APHA leadership continues.)

Responding to the strong feelings among our OHS Section members, APHA Executive Director Georges Benjamin assisted us by requesting a conference call by OHS Section leaders with CDC leadership, which CDC agreed to. On July 23, 2004, I and four other former and future OHS section chairpersons spoke at length to Donald Schreiber, Director of CDC’s Washington Office and a senior advisor to Gerberding. Schreiber expressed his and Gerberding’s strong support for the work of NIOSH and of its Director, and asked us to trust him and the CDC leadership that this reorganization to streamline CDC’s structure would not harm NIOSH or reduce its importance to and within CDC. However, at no time during the conversation did Schreiber suggest that CDC was willing to reconsider its basic decision with respect to NIOSH or any other CDC agency.

At a later August 10 meeting with leaders of other health and safety groups, the CDC decision was also discussed and debated. At that meeting, “Dr. Gerberding expressed real concern and passion for NIOSH,” said Frank Mirer, Director of Health and Safety for the United Auto Workers International Union. But in the end, he said, "the message to us was 'Get over it. This is a done deal.' " (Washington Post, August 31, 2004, p.A19 – <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A47541-2004Aug30.html?referrer=email>).

The debate over the CDC reorganization is far from over. OHS Section members intend to submit a late-breaking resolution to the APHA Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. this November putting APHA on record in opposition to the reorganization. Also, Congressional opponents of the move are mobilizing against it.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), Chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the CDC, rejected the notion that the deal was indeed done, according to the Aug. 31 Washington Post article (op.cit.). "I am not going to go along with the change," he said in the Washington Post interview, and stated his intention to hold a hearing on the matter before October.

OHS Section members can rest assured that the leadership of this section will continue strenuously to oppose the CDC reorganization as it affects NIOSH, as we continue to support our colleagues at NIOSH.