New Heat Stress Guide
The Occupational Health and Safety Council of Ontario (OHSCO) has released a new (itals)Heat Stress Awareness Guide,(enditlas) endorsed by the MOL and the WSIB.
OHSCO – which includes CSAO, Ontario’s other health and safety associations, the MOL and the WSIB – recognized a problem with existing heat-stress guidelines. They were based on wet bulb globe temperature, which requires the use of a specialized and expensive instrument. OHSCO wanted to ensure that all workplaces could assess heat-stress accurately and inexpensively, and then use the information to protect workers.
The new (itals)Heat Stress Awareness Guide(enditals) doesn’t use web bulb globe temperature. Instead, you first take a reading from a thermal hygrometer (a heat and humidity metre, usually $20 to $60 at hardware stores). The Guide tells you how to adjust the reading depending on workers’ clothing and radiant hear. Then, you use the (itals)Heat Stress Action Chart(enditals) to determine what actions employers and workers need to take to prevent heat stress.
The 20-page Guide includes information about the causes of heat stress, how to recognize symptoms, an example of a heat stress policy, and much more.
You can download a copy from www.csao.org.
