What has already been

What has already been said about thermal hazards can also apply at work.
Where automatic stoking equipment is not in use, furnace workers wear heat-resistant clothing, especially gloves; and also goggles to protect eyes from glare and sparks.
This also applies where substances like molten steel, glass and tar are poured.
In some climates, outdoor workers have to be trained to take protective measures against exposure to long periods of sunlight leading to dehydration because of perspiration loss; or to heat stroke; or after long exposure and to an increasing rise in the incidence of skin cancer (Nichols, 1988).
At the other end of the scale and there are industries where excessive cold is used such as refrigeration in the fishing industry, and cold storage rooms in the catering business.
Workers need to understand how quickly human tissue freezes, and the necessary precautions to prevent its occurrence.
Workers who can be exposed to excessively cold weather conditions have not only to know about survival measures during over-exposure, but be able and willing to carry them out.
Workers in the pharmaceutical industry and in laboratories obviously have to be knowledgeable and skilled to avoid the many chemical hazards which can threaten the safety of their environment.
When the chemicals could damage the skin or the eyes, adequate protection is essential.
And in establishments where workers handle infected material, for example in laboratories or in hospital laundries and strict contamination control measures and protective clothing are obligatory.
Where workers make sharp equipment, or use machines  with cutting edges and moving parts, use of adequate guarding is essential to maintain safety in their environment.
Wherever possible automatic safety factors are built into the machines, for instance by making them unworkable unless the guards are in place.
If this is not the case, it is imperative that workers build safety factors into their work pattern from the beginning and there is usually work training to underscore this.
Some groups of health care workers are subject to certain types of injury and accident.
For example, back injury is common among nurses and there is growing concern about the need to instruct nurses in proper lifting techniques (p. 252) and to encourage them to use mechanical lifting devices as much as possible.
Exposure to radiation is another area of concern, affecting radiologists, doctors, dentists and nurses who are involved in the use of X-ray procedures and care of patients undergoing treatment with radioactive substances.
Female staff of childbearing age, particularly women who are known to be pregnant and require special protection from radiation hazards and there are codes of practice which apply to radiotherapy and X-ray procedures.
Quite apart from radiation hazards in the health care sector and there is concern about the magnitude of the risk of cancer for workers in the nuclear industry itself.
In an attempt to quantify the risk and the Ministry of Defence in the UK commissioned a study of staff engaged in atomic weapons research at Aldermaston and associated establishments who had had repeated exposure to low levels of ionising radiation.
A total of 22 552 workers were followed up on an average of 18.6 years.
Overall mortality was 23% lower than the national average for all causes of death and 18% lower for cancer.
For a small group of workers, however, who had experienced above average external exposure and had also been monitored for internal contamination by radionuclides and the mortality from cancer of the prostate gland and the lung was raised (Beral et al, 1988).
In workforces in the USA, excess mortality from prostatic cancer has also been reported in the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and in a weapon plant but, Beral et al continue and recent data from the Japanese atomic bomb survivors show no association between a single acute exposure to high levels of radiation and mortality from prostatic cancer.
The authors indicate therefore that excesses of prostatic cancer in industrial workforces are unlikely to be due to external radiation.
Cancers in other specific body sites were also monitored and compared with surveys from other countries but more research requires to be done.
Certainly following the far-flung effects of the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in 1986 and the health hazards associated with nuclear products have been highlighted, not only for employees and people in the immediate environs of a nuclear plant but also for people and terrain far distant from the scene of the nuclear leak.
Considerable public pressure is being put on governments and large companies to utilise energy sources other than nuclear power for industry and commerce, and there are strident demands for stricter supervision to prevent accidents and to monitor the disposal of nuclear waste products.
According to the International Herald Tribune (Keller, 1988) there are reports from Moscow that five planned Soviet nuclear power stations have been cancelled since the 1986 disaster in the Ukraine.
So important is the subject of a safe work environment that most countries have legislation requiring protective practices at all places of employment.
Standards are set for ventilation, heating, lighting, hygiene and safety features of tools and equipment, fire precautions, first aid facilities and provision is made for occupational health services.