Chemical Forums

Specialty Chemistry Forums => Other Sciences Question Forum => Topic started by: rius on July 22, 2014, 05:00:41 AM

Title: What do you do to prevent yourself from chemicals?
Post by: rius on July 22, 2014, 05:00:41 AM
In the lab. or process/plant area, what do you do to get your body be safe from the harms effects of chemicals. You know it's very dangerous and unhealthy work . If you breath chemicals in long time then you would be probably sick in the future.

The prospectus and cautions are gives useful information and knowledge for us to be safe ourselves against harmful chemicals but is this enough?
Maybe in the future some other molecules will be determined as risky and harmful...
Title: Re: What do you do to prevent yourself from chemicals?
Post by: Corribus on July 22, 2014, 09:53:16 AM
In the lab? PPE like a fume hood, gloves, goggles are standard. In special situations other precautions may be warranted, such as blast shield, face shield, respirator, and so on. It depends on the chemical and process. In practice, universities do not often enforce safety standards (or they do so only in a token way - like a yearly 1 hour seminar). This may slowly change in the wake of what has happened with Patrick Harran of UCLA. (http://blog.chembark.com/2014/06/22/ucla-professor-patrick-harran-strikes-deal-with-prosecutors/) Let's hope so. It's amazing more graduate students aren't injured in the lab at Universities.

In the plant, usually regulatory agencies (at least in the US) like OSHA establish safety guidelines and conduct inspections to make sure they are being followed. Most chemicals have set exposure levels. These rules definitely are usually followed because of the severe penalties for noncompliance (financial and criminal).