Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!amdcad!ames!mailrus!iuvax!rutgers!mcnc!ecsvax!roy@phri
From: roy@phri (Roy Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.society.women
Subject: Re: VDTs again
Message-ID: <5314@ecsvax.uncecs.edu>
Date: 13 Sep 88 12:15:14 GMT
References: <5303@ecsvax.uncecs.edu>
Sender: skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu
Organization: Public Health Research Inst. (NY, NY)
Lines: 48
Approved: skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Moderator -- Trish Roberts)
Comments-to: comp-women-request@cs.purdue.edu
Submissions-to: comp-women@cs.purdue.edu


skyler@ecsvax.uncecs.edu (Patricia Roberts) writes:
> some unions are requesting that it be written into the contracts that
> pregnant women may request a transfer or sick leave or various other
> things rather than work with VDTs. [...] I wonder if such contracts make
> women much less attractive employment prospects

	I'm sure it does.  Recently around here, Sufolk County (far half of
Long Island, distant NYC suburbs) passed a law requiring all sorts of
special protections for VDT operators.  The law specified work hours, kind
of seating and lighting, etc.  I'm sure it also specified transfer
privileges for pregnant women.

	Depending on who you talk to, it was either an excellent piece of
progressive social/labor reform legislation or a vile, oppressive bill
which cowtowed to the hysterical fears of the uneducated masses.  In any
case, the result was that several large companies announced that the cost
of doing business in Sufolk county just got too high and that they would
take their planned expansions elsewhere.
-- 
Roy Smith, System Administrator
Public Health Research Institute
{allegra,philabs,cmcl2,rutgers}!phri!roy -or- phri!roy@uunet.uu.net
"The connector is the network"

[According to the July 10, 1988 NY _Times_ the Suffold law does not address
the pregnancy issue.  Another  article in the _Times_ (unfortunately, when
I cut it out of the paper, I didn't note the date) says:

	...a new law passed on Tuesday by the Suffolk County
	Legislature requiring companies to subsidize annual
	eye examinations for VDT qorkers and eyeglasses or
	contact lenses if needed because of working on terminals.

	The law was not based on concerns about radiation
	emissions or miscarriages, according to its backers,
	but rather on studies, here and abroad, that detected
	such ailments as eyestrain, stiff necks, and crippling
	hand and wrist pains among workers who put in long hours
	at terminals.

	The American Academiy of Opthalmology...today reiterated
	its position that "there is no convincing scientific evidence
	that VDT's are hazardous to the eyes."

In other words, it's a similar situation--the law was passed before conclusive
evidence as to damage.  That is either playing it safe or playing it scared.
TR]