ARTICLES | David Michaels

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America's Workplaces Are Still Too Dangerous

The New York Times
by David Michaels

April 28, 2021

[OSHA, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration] which I directed from 2009 to 2017, has improved working conditions for generations of Americans. But in recent years, progress has slowed. Thanks to OSHA’s efforts, countless workers have been spared injuries, illnesses, disability and premature death. But too many are still being hurt on the job. The Covid-19 pandemic has taught us the value of the often invisible workers who make our economy function. OSHA should modernize to ensure that all workers are able to do their jobs and at the end of their shifts go home safe and healthy.

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Harvard Business Review

by David Michaels

March 21, 2018

Companies can be successful and safe at the same time. The reality is that virtually all workplace injuries are preventable, and safety management and operational excellence are intimately linked. Injuries and catastrophic events, in addition to being tragic, are evidence that production is not being managed correctly. Improved operational performance will result in fewer injuries.

Reimagining Our System for Public Health Protection

American Journal of Public Health

by David Michaels

June 5, 2019

The system through which US government agencies protect the public’s health, safety, and environment is being severely challenged. It faces concerted efforts to weaken the laws and regulations that require corporations to limit air and water pollution, clean up land or drinking water they have contaminated, market safe products to consumers, and eliminate workplace hazards. At the same time, there is an exodus of dedicated and experienced civil servants who are frustrated with these new developments. Much effort will be needed to rebuild this system of vital protections.

Conflicts of Interest Could Undermine the Cleanup Efforts in East Palestine

TIME
by David Michaels

March 14, 2023

Many residents of East Palestine, Ohio, are suspicious of the environmental contractor Norfolk Southern has brought in to measure chemical exposures following last month’s massive train derailment, toxic spill, and chemical burn off. Over the last decade, the Center for Toxicology and Environmental Health (CTEH) has become the go-to contractor for corporations looking to follow up on environmental disasters to which they’ve been connected. The residents of East Palestine have reason to be suspicious. My experience working at government regulatory agencies in both the Clinton and Obama Administrations has led me to conclude that CTEH’s business model often entails providing clients with the ammunition to slow regulation or defeat court claims.

Halting Workplace COVID-19 Transmission: An Urgent Proposal to Protect American Workers

The Century Foundation

by David Michaels and Gregory R. Wagner

November 26, 2019

COVID-19’s is a massive worker safety crisis. Hundreds of thousands of workers have been sickened and thousands of them have died. This report examines the conditions under which COVID-19 has spread through workplace transmission and assesses the failures of OSHA and the federal government to protect workers from exposure. It then presents an eleven-point plan—to be directed by the federal government, working in close coordination with state and local public health authorities—for stopping workplace transmission of COVID-19.

Seven Ways to Improve Operations without Sacrificing Worker Safety

Environmental Justice Is Essential in the Workplace and at Home

The Nation

by David Michaels and Robert Bullard

October 22, 2021

It is now widely recognized that communities of color in the United States are far more likely than their white counterparts to be exposed to pollution and toxic wastes in their neighborhoods. However, there is another crucial aspect of environmental and racial justice that has not gained the same recognition: environment justice in the workplace. Injustices in the work environment, including toxic chemicals, unguarded machines, working unprotected at heights or in extreme heat, and now Covid-19, are as dangerous as those outside the factory fence. Black and brown workers are more likely to be exposed to workplace hazards than white workers and as a result are at greater risk of injury, illness, and death.

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America is Failing to Protect Workers from Extreme Heat

The Atlantic

by David Michaels

July 18, 2023

This summer, the climate crisis has brought intense heat and toxic wildfire smoke to much of the country. These conditions are a threat to us all, but they are particularly lethal to those who work outside, in the nation's fields or construction sites, and even to some who work indoors.

I led the Occupational Safety and Health Administration under Obama, and I understand why it hasn't stepped up to address the threat of climate change.

A National Strategy for COVID-19: Testing, Surveillance, and Mitigation Strategies

JAMA
by David Michaels, Ezekiel J. Emanuel, and Rick A. Bright

January 6, 2022

At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the response of the US federal government was seriously flawed. Early guidance on testing was mistargeted, getting tested was a logistical nightmare, and too few tests were performed. Once an acceptable, yet suboptimal, testing infrastructure was established, it was marginalized, thought to be superfluous because of the vaccines. Even now, testing results are not reliably linked with sociodemographic data, vaccination status, or clinical outcomes; the availability of reliable rapid tests remains limited; and prices are too high.

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We Have the Technology to Stop Superspreading Without Masks

NYTimes

by David Michaels

April 21, 2022

At every stage of the pandemic, a disproportionate number of coronavirus infections have been traced to a relatively small number of gatherings, also known as superspreader events. The recent Gridiron dinner, after which over 70 people tested positive, including members of the Biden administration, is just the latest example. Some public health experts argue that tolerating these events is what living with Covid looks like. As far as we know, no one who tested positive after the Gridiron dinner became severely ill, but we don’t know if these cases also spread to workers and beyond. There’s little reason to accept this as a new normal.

OSHA Can Do More to Protect Americans from Covid-19

NYTimes

by David Michaels and Jordan Barab

January 14, 2022

The Supreme Court’s decision on Thursday to block the Occupational Safety and Health Administration from requiring large employers to make sure that their workers are either vaccinated against the coronavirus or masked at work and tested weekly was a setback for America’s efforts to stop the pandemic. The six Republican-appointed justices are helping to prolong the pandemic, endanger workers and extend the labor shortage that has disrupted the economy.

But the justices may also have opened the door for a more comprehensive rule that will better protect the nation’s workers, and it is one that OSHA should have issued months ago.

FDR only allowed 1,000 refugees to escape Hitler’s Germany. My ‘family’ was among them.

Los Angeles Times

by David Michaels

August 16, 2019

At the height of World War II, as Adolf Hitler was presiding over the mass murder of Europe’s Jews, President Franklin D. Roosevelt kept our borders closed. Informed of the ongoing slaughter, he decided to permit only a thousand refugees entrance to America and allowed them to remain here only until the war ended. I grew up with two families: a traditional one, and the one we called our “Oswego family,” these refugees and their partners and children. . . .

Smoke from Canadian wildfires shows outdoor workers need air quality protections

STAT

by David Michaels and Susan Anenberg

June 28, 2023

Mercenary Science: A Field Guide to Recognizing Scientific Disinformation

American Educator

by David Michaels

Winter 2021

Science underpins all public health and environmental regulations. The basic principle of the regulatory system holds that decisions must be made on the basis of the best evidence available at the time. Mercenary science obscures that best evidence. In doing so, it doesn’t just game our system; it prevents our government from accomplishing one of the reasons for its very existence: to enable some individuals (especially the owners of corporations) to profit by producing something or performing a task that does not impinge on the freedom and well-being of other individuals. We want stronger regulation not because we don’t care about freedom, but because we cannot be free without the state’s protection from harm.

SELECT SCIENTIFIC JOURNAL PUBLICATIONS

Michaels D, Wagner GR, Ryan L. Lessons From COVID-19 for Protecting Workers in the Next Pandemic. JAMA. 2023 Jun 16. doi: 10.1001/jama.2023.8229.

Michaels D, Emanuel EJ, Bright RA. A National Strategy for COVID-19: Testing, Surveillance, and Mitigation Strategies. JAMA. 2022 Jan 18;327(3):213-214.

Michaels D, Wagner GR. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and Worker Safety During the COVID-19 Pandemic. JAMA. 2020;324(14):1389-1390.

Michaels D, Barab J. OSHA at 50: Protecting Workers in a Changing Economy. Amer J Public Health 2020;110(5):631-635.

Michaels, D. Reimagining Our System for Public Health Protection, Amer J Public Health 109(7):975-976 2019.

Michaels D, Burke T. The Dishonest HONEST Act. Science 356:989 2017.

Michaels D. OSHA Does Not Kill Jobs: It Helps Prevent Jobs from Killing Workers. Amer J Ind Med 55:961-963, 2012.

Michaels D, Howard J. Review of the OSHA-NIOSH Response to the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill: Protecting the Health and Safety of Cleanup Workers. PLOS Currents Disasters. 2012;4:e4fa83b7576b7576e.

Michaels D. Addressing Conflict in Strategic Literature Reviews: Disclosure is not Enough. J Epidemiol Comm Health. 63:599-600, 2009.

Michaels D, Monforton C. Beryllium’s Public Relations Problem. Protecting Workers When There Is No Safe Exposure Level. Public Health Reports 123:79-88, 2008.

Michaels D, Monforton C. How Litigation Shapes the Scientific Literature: Asbestos and Disease Among Automobile Mechanics. J Law & Policy 5(3):1137-1169, 2007.

Michaels D, Monforton C. Lurie P. Selected Science: An Industry Campaign to Undermine an OSHA Hexavalent Chromium Standard. Environmental Health 5:5, 2006.

Michaels D. Sarbanes-Oxley for Science. Law & Contemp Problems 69(3):1-19, 2006.

Michaels D. Scientific Evidence and Public Policy. Amer J Public Health 95:Suppl1.S5, 2005.

Michaels D, Monforton C. Manufacturing Uncertainty. Contested Science and the Protection of the Public’s Health and Environment. Amer J Public Health 95.Suppl1:S39-48, 2005.

Wagner W, Michaels D. Equal Treatment for Regulatory Science. Extending the Controls Governing the Quality of Public Research to Private Research. Amer J Law Med 30:119-154, 2004.