Blumenthal, Schumer Push Feds to Immediately Begin NY & CT Nail Salon Inspections; Ask OSHA to Consider Emergency Update to Toxic Exposure Limits to Ensure Health of Workers; OSHA is Agency With Resources & Experience to Best Protect Nail Salon Workers, But Must Step Up Its Game

Today, U.S. Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) wrote to the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) at the Department of Labor to demand a swift investigation into dangerous nail salon working conditions and to help educate workers who might feel victimized within the industry. The Senators also asked OSHA to conduct an emergency update to chemical exposure limits, efforts that would move much faster than a standard exposure limit review. The Senators' push follows a report by The New York Times exposing the extreme danger nail salon chemicals pose to the health of workers. In a letter to OSHA Assistant Secretary David Michaels, the Senators requested that OSHA take immediate action and aggressively enforce chemical exposure limits in nail salons, as well as update outdated and unacceptable safety requirements to ensure that the health of current and future salon workers is adequately protected.

"There are thousands upon thousands of nail salons across the country and employment for nail salon workers is projected to grow 16 percent from 2012 to 2022 ­ faster than the average for all occupations. As this nail salon industry continues to grow, it is critical that OSHA take the action steps necessary to prevent further harm to the tens of thousands of workers in this industry."

"Troublingly, OSHA's federal standards are widely recognized by the industrial hygiene community as insufficiently protective of health. Most of the permissible exposure limits (PELs) were determined in the 1970s using outdated and possibly flawed science and studies, and have never been updated," they wrote. "This means that nail salons can meet legal requirements without actually providing a safe working environment for their workers."

"Your agency has an immediate and urgent duty to protect workers at nails salons by imposing strong remedial measures where existing and ongoing conditions endanger health and safety. Such conditions are intolerable, morally and legally, but effective enforcement can stop them. OSHA must issue stronger legal standards that protect the health of nail salon workers. Thus, I urge you to immediately update the PELs for chemicals commonly found in nail salons, and to engage in a coordinated investigation of worker health conditions in this industry."

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