Little different than other hazards and that the focus of osha is to figure out how to make sure the workplace is safe in the most effective way to do that is to have regulations and a standard where employers must protect workers. Osha has had standards for that for people who work on groups or people who dig trenches or people who are exposed to benzene or other carcinogens or even bloodborne pathogens like ebola or hiv aids. Not done in this administration is issue a standard to say employers must protect workers. They have issued some guidance and issued some suggestions. They have not said employers shall do certain things. That one of the industries has come into focus is food plant workers and what they face. The president is using the federal production act when it comes to meet plat meatpacking plants. What should be the requirement for those workers when they go to work and what should be provided for them . Guest every country knows the primary way that we protect all of us from exposure is social distancing, six feet of distance plus clubs and handwashing and hand sanitation. In situations where the virus is really flying around, personal protective equipment. Those are the requirements. They are the same requirements using hospitals the same requirements we use on public transportation. Those should be the same requirements in meatpacking plants. Its common sense but there are thousands of meat workers who have been infected and some have already died because of exposure. Host when the president use come with does it a requirement or standard that says you have to supply these things or does it fall under suggestions . Guest yes, it falls under suggestions. There is no requirement at all, there is no role for osha to enforce this. It does not give the usda any authority on the usda has no interest in protecting workers. In some ways, it makes everything worse. Right now, you have a situation across the country where hundreds of workers are getting. Ick at individual plants the companies themselves, or in some cases pushed by local Health Authorities or the government, have given up disinfection. During that time, workers gets paid but the workplace gets clean so they can hopefully reopen safely and thats whats been going on across the country. With this invocation of the dpa, as far as i understand it, the plants are not allowed to close. The situation will clearly get worse. They have not been replaced. The workforce has gotten much larger, but the number of inspectors is getting lower. It is really very unfortunate what is going on with osha right now. I left in january, 2017. I have not been replaced. There has been no assistant secretary in 40 months. The position was empty for so long and there was no nominee, so by law, she continued to be the acting assistant secretary. Half of the senior positions are empty. Agency is filled with dedicated professionals who want to do everything they can to protect workers, but they are working with one they are not working with one hand tied behind their back, they are working with two hands tied behind their back. Host when it comes to inspectors, isnt that a systemic problem no matter what administration, the number of inspectors that are concerned . Guest absolutely. Osha has been starved. Congress is who gives osha money and we had a big bump when the democrats took control of that house. The number of inspectors was flat and now it is going down. Saying that while inspectors are important, even if you double the numbers of inspectors, youre not going to be able to reach every workplace. The capacityha has workplace oncery every 165 years. Even if you double it, its only once every 82 and a half years. You want to make the inspect her Inspector Group larger. Thats addressing a whole industry. Forssued a new standard work with silica. Common on construction sites and we issued new standards, every employer in that industry has to look at their workplace and figure out how to get the right making it very clear that none of this is enforceable. And i have to tell you, the numbers i have seen are 4000, 5000. We have known from the beginning how to control exposure, but the Meat Industry has ignored it. The guidance, the suggestions are not adequate. And workers are paying the price with their lives. Talk a little bit we will about some of the recommendations you were making, but we want to have you talk with some callers. With simone in Silver Spring maryland. Go ahead. Caller the governor of virginia has said that dental Office Workers can go back to work, but we are frontline workers, too. Testw you cannot everybody, but is osha even making recommendations . Thank you. Guest thank you for your question. Ofs the same sort recommendations as other industries. You have to make sure people have social distance and ppe. Work cannot be done probablyght now, it should not be done in emergency circumstances. I dont know the specifics of a dental office or how that will work out, but certainly, you are going to be close to one another in things that could be coming out of the mouth. Especially droplets, you have to make sure people are very protected and there are ways to do that. Its awkward but it can be done. You really have to do that because we cannot let more people get sick. Host alicia is next also in Silver Spring, go ahead. Caller good morning and thank you to cspan. My question for mr. Michaels is when Vice President pence visited the mayo clinic and he did not wear a mask, kind of what kind of message was he trying to project . When i return to work in an office environment, i will probably want to wear a mask and maybe some gloves. My question is, why is the highest official not wearing a mask during his visit . Thank you. Guest i wish i could answer that question definitively. Obviously, i can only speculate on what goes on in his mind. Its a little shocking to be in a facility, a worldclass medical facility filled with some of the top medical specialists in the world and everyone around you was wearing a mask and you are not . I have no idea. Maybe he thinks he knows something all these people dont . Or he is positive he could not be spreading the virus himself even if he is tested twice a week, he could be positive. There were all sorts of issues with this program. He should know this as head of the task force. He was probably trying to put out some image that he is very macho. It wouldnt be the image that we are safe and dont need to wear a mask because everyone around him was wearing a mask. Perhaps some reporter at the next briefing will ask what message he is trying to put out. Host from twitter guest the Workers Compensation system for the most part covers work related injuries and illnesses. If a condition is work related, that is the exclusive remedy. You cant sue your employer under except under extraordinary circumstances. Anyone who has done workers comp says its a terrible system. You have a portion of lost wages and you were supposed to get your total medical bill coverage but in many states, your employer gets to choose the doctor. Many people around the country are looking at the situation thinking that this is the inability of the workers comp situation and the inability of osha to protect workers may require new legal thinking. There is one lawsuit going on in missouri at a meatpacking plant where the workers and the community are suing the company under a nuisance, the idea that the company has created a nuisance. Nuisance sounds like a minor issue. But if you have pestilence or rats, that is a nuisance and you could be getting sick. It also may be that if the Workers Compensation carrier says this case is not work related, then workers can sue their employer because its rejected by workers comp. In general, its not a great solution. The reason we have osha is to say we need to prevent people from getting sick rather than wait until after they are sick and compensating them and fighting overcompensation. Our system is failing right now and unfortunately, litigation may be the only way to convince employers to go back to do whats necessary. I understanding is thats a lot of whats behind the defense procurement act executive order for the president. John tyson, the president of tyson foods was very concerned about liability in this litigation in missouri really woke him up. He said we could be liable. He went to President Trump and President Trump announced that the administration would try to essentially give a free pass, a get out of jail free card to eliminate any sort of liability. Thats the same thing Mitch Mcconnell has said. Mitch mcconnell has said there would be no more legislation providing monetary aid to Small Businesses and the hospitals in the states unless there is Liability Protection for corporations. I look at this with some shock. You look at whats going on in meatpacking plants. If the meatpacking plants are given a free pass, they can do anything they want and dont have to worry about workers suing them. Tyson foods has for many years had a license to kill chickens and now theyre asking for a license to kill workers and thats just wrong. Host one of the comments from senator mcconnell on a recent show talking about what you just talked about he said imagine your business is going to reopen and lawyers are sharpening their pencils getting ready to sue you, claiming you didnt involve proper distancing, we can pass a bill unless we have Liability Protection, thats the only way we can get past this. Guest that is a vote of noconfidence in american businesses. You just cant do it. Whatever the outcome is, who cares . Host you are an essential worker, good morning. Caller good morning, what is the protocol or standard for a mandatory overtime for essential workers . Guest there is no new law that gives, in any state, that gives mandatory overtime payments to new workers. If you work overtime after 40 hours, you get time and to have in most businesses. If you dont have a union, you are forced to take that over time. If you dont accept it, you can be fired because you have no Legal Protection at all. In the washington, d. C. Area where i worked, many essential workers represented by unions all have premium pay. They have gotten pay increases, a few dollars per hour for Grocery Stores because they have a union. The only protection the workers have in the only way they can be protected and do better under the overtime situation is if they have a union that can negotiate a better relationship with their employer. Host from washington, peggy is next. Caller i want to make a comment. I think this administration better keep the immigrants coming for these meatpacking plants. I dont know any american who wants to work under those conditions, thank you. Guest these plans are appalling in terms of the conditions even before covid19. Osha would send our inspectors into the poultry plants in alabama and georgia. Workers would be in cold, wet environments, elbow to elbow, making repetitive cuts on the elbowto shoulder, to elbow, shoulder to shoulder, making repetitive cuts on the chickens which are going by quickly. The line goes 140 birds per minute. Imagine how fast that is. You have to keep cutting over and over again and causes tremendous musculoskeletal problems like carpal tunnel which is a disease of the wrist which you can get from doing the same action over and over again. The National Institute for Occupational Health went into one chicken plant in South Carolina and they measured the prevalence, 40 of workers had carpal tunnel syndrome and the next year, they found 40 of the workers had carpal tunnel but it was new workers. The other workers had left. Many of them are immigrants. The pay is not very good. People from other countries who come here looking for better lives are willing to take those jobs. They rarely get Workers Compensation from Companies Like them. Because the Companies Fight them. And that was before we got to this situation. Whats not gotten too much publicity is because we have been talking about the need for more food on the table, the chicken Companies Like purdue and tyson have requested the right to speed up the line. The usda which is an agency that is a fully owned subsidiary of the agriculture industry, the usda took these requests to speed up the line and they agreed. Instead of 140 chickens per minute, the line is going even faster. As far as i know, these companies have not instituted the distancing in between workers because if you put people six feet apart, then you have to slow down the line that means lower production. Instead, they are speeding up the line and by doing that, they are ensuring that we will have more cases of covid19. What we are seeing is small towns across america where these poultry plants are and pork plants are located are becoming the new centers of disease. Host buffalo, new york, tom is next, go ahead. Caller yes, i used to work in the Steel Industry in gulfport, new york. There were a lot of different accidents that would happen in the plant where people would get hurt, sometimes people got killed in the plant. We had osha and we were lucky we had osha. They would put regulations in their where the company couldnt do certain things that made our jobs even more dangerous. The other thing i want to say is you guys talked about what Mitch Mcconnell said and he mentioned for frivolous lawsuits. I have only have one thing to say about that, they had the king they have the king of frivolous lawsuit sitting in the white house. Thats my comment. Guest i think your comment speaks for itself. I have spoken with bluecollar workers across the country. Osha has saved a lot of lives and thats why its so tragic and unfortunate that this administration has told osha that if i could give a message to the secretary of labor who controls osha, he runs that agency and he has disappeared. Where is the secretary of labor . He appeared once at the White House Task force press briefing for a couple of minutes. He has put out no strong statement about how workers need to be protected. He has issued a mealymouthed press release reminding employers that its against the law to retaliate against workers when they raise concerns about safety but says nothing about the osha ability to go after those employers and say we will not allow it. I would love to find out, does he not want to be associated with this response at all . He is so far in the backseat, he is not even in the car. He has taken osha with him. He is essentially telling osha you cannot do anything here. We know that osha could do a lot just by getting out there and him being on tv and reminding employers with a should be doing. A really interesting study just came out with an economist at duke university. He looked at the impact of press releases osha puts out and how that impacted what other employers did. Osha finds hazards and issue fines. Then we put out a press release. That press release would impact other employers in the area who read the press release. One press release got the same amount of compliance as 210 inspections. We know that being on tv, in the media, sending out messages is a very Important Role for osha and the Labor Department and even for the president in this crisis. There is no discussion about protecting workers. Everything that President Trump has said is full speed ahead, who cares what happens to these workers . Host David Michaels was the former assistant secretary of labor under the obama debt under the Obama Administration at osha. A question for you from pat in michigan, he texted this morning. You may have to explain this a little bit. Guest the general duty clause is part of the osha law that says every employer must provide a safe workplace. Thats in addition to the standards i talked about so osha can go to a situation where there is no standard and issue a general duty call violation. The most famous one was against a sea world when a killer whale killed a trainer. Osha does not have standards for killer wheels so we used the general duty clause to issue a small fine against sea world. The total ended up being about 14,000 and it almost went to the supreme court, it went to the d. C. Court of appeals. It was tough to use the general duty clause. You have to prove a bunch of things and it has no precedential value. If they issue a violation of an inspection at one meet plant, it doesnt tell anything to the other meat plants. While osha says the general duty clause applies, it doesnt have the preventive effect. What we need is the emergency standard that says every employer must follow cdc recommendations and osha recommendations and standards. There is legislation in front of the house and the senate to require osha to issue that. The primary sponsor in the house is the chairman of the labor committee, bobby scott of virginia. It has a large number of cosponsors in the house and the senate. That legislation would essentially make osha do what it ought to be doing but secretarysacalia is not doing which is issue an emergency standard to say every employer must follow these rules