Unions issue V.D.U. health guidelines

Press, 14 March 1985, Page 34

Unions issue V.D.U. health guidelines

NZPA-AP Geneva Fourteen international trade unions, citing forecasts that half of the workforce in Western countries will be using visual display units (V.D.U.s) regularly by 1990, have issed guidelines designed to protect health and safety of people working with screens. They say that to date “scientific research does not permit firm conclusions” about health effects that might be linked to V.D.U.s, but that “regulations should err heavily on the side of caution whenever there is the slightest doubt about possible hazards.” The guidelines are contained in a 91-page manual compiled after a conference last October at Geneva, seat of the hosting International Federation of Commercial, Clerical, Professional and Technical Employees and several other international unions.

The manual lists eye

strain as the single most common health problem reported by V.D.U. users. “Although it is sometimes argued that visual performance can be affected in the long term by the use of V.D.U.S, there is little medical evidence to support this thesis.” It said that there was no doubt, however, that workers whose eye defects were not corrected or corrected only imperfectly would suffer greater eye strain.

Therefore, it recommends, all V.D.U. workers should have an annual ophthalmological examination at the expense of their employer. If it was medically determined that a worker’s eyesight could not be sufficiently corrected to allow working on a V.D.U., collective bargaining agreements should provide for alternative employment in a nonV.D.U. job without loss in “salary, job grade, seniority,

or responsibility.” The manual lists reports in recent years, mainly in the United States, about cases of abnormal pregnancies alleged possibly to be linked with the use of V.D.U.s. “There is no consensus about whether there is any direct causal link between V.D.U. use and these occurrences,” it said. The manual says that pending more extensive scientific research, labour negotiators should seek agreements allowing pregnant women to transfer temporarily to non-V.D.U. work “without loss of pay, status, or career prospects.”

The unions recommend that these agreements should also cover women “planning to become pregnant” because the most critical period for foetal damage was the first five weeks after conception. “As with preproductive hazards it is impossible to say whether there is or is

not a connection between V.D.U. use and cataract formation,” the manual says.

It recommends that a person showing any cataract formation symptoms should be immediately removed from V.D.U. work with pay and conditions protected.

Contaminants “frequently found in office environments” may contribute to health problems experienced by V.D.U. operators, the manual says, listing insulation asbestos, carbon monoxide from cigarette smoking, ozone from photocopying machines, cleaners, and other agents.

The manual recommends that negotiators aim at limiting intensive V.D.U. work to a maximum of 50 per cent daily working time. It also proposes breaks of “at least 15 minutes per hour of intensive V.D.U. work and 15 minutes per two hours for other V.D.U. work.”