Center for the Study of Ethics in the Professions at IIT

The American Public Health Association,

Understanding that both men and women workers are at risk from exposure to substances such as lead, waste anesthetic gases, and carbon disulfide¹ which may damage their reproductive systems and potentially affect their offspring; and

Noting that there is a need to protect all workers in the workplace regardless of sex, including the need to protect reproductive capabilities; and

Recognizing that their rights can be assured only when workplace exposures to chemicals and other hazards are reduced to a level which is safe for both men and women; and

Noting that corporations have responded to the reproductive hazards posed by chemicals in their plants by adopting a policy of altering the workforce rather than the workplace; that is, corporations are eliminating workers they consider "vulnerable" rather than eliminating the hazards, e.g., women are being fired from jobs in lead smelters and from jobs in the rubber industry where workers handle vinyl chloride; and

Appreciating that workers who are already in these plants are faced with a Draconian choice between their jobs and the risks of sterility, reproductive problems or children with birth defects; and

Noting that male workers continuing to work with hazardous exposures risk sterility and birth defects in their children; and

Noting further that workers seeking jobs in these plants are being excluded solely because of their reproductive capacity, e.g., General Motors is refusing to hire fertile women at their Delco-Remy battery plants where lead is handled; and

Recognizing that the most conspicuous victims of this discriminatory policy are women in the chemical, nuclear, automobile, rubber and steel industries; and

Noting that under the guise of concern for fetuses, their employers are forcing them to choose between sterilization or loss of their jobs and have stopped hiring women for jobs posing any reproductive hazards, e.g., at Willow Island, West Virginia, five women working for the American Cyanamid Company had themselves sterilized in order to keep their jobs; and

Noting that this so-called corporate concern for fetuses, has focused on women in better paying jobs in industries in which they have not traditionally worked and little concern has been shown for the fetuses of women in traditional, lower payingjobs; and

Noting that men are the victims of this corporate policy as much as are their women co-workers because if they remain in plants where they are exposed to toxic substances, they face the possibility of impotency, sterility or genetic mutations which cause birth defects in their children; therefore,

1. Condemns the corporate practice of forcing workers to choose between their jobs and the right to reproduce, and urges that copies of this resolution be sent to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the Equal Employment Opportunity Committee, and other relevant federal agencies as well as members of relevant committees of Congress;

2. Urges that NIOSH develop and OSHA disseminate support and enforce appropriate occupational exposure standards that protect women, men, and the fetus;

3. Urges that labor unions, OSHA/MSHA, and federal and state legislation support the right of pregnant workers or workers who intend to reproduce to transfer, upon request, to safe jobs with full rate retention and all seniority rights during the interim while standards that protect all workers and the fetus are established and met; and

4. Joins with other concerned groups and individuals in the Coalition for the Reproductive Rights of Workers.

References

1. Scott R: Reproductive Hazards. Job Safety and Health, May 1978, p. 7.