At Least 50 GA Warehouse Workers Sickened By Known Carcinogen Used To Sterilize Medical Supplies

[hatrack]

The bruises on Alexandria Pittman’s body wouldn’t go away. Nor would the aches that plagued her at her new job at a distribution center in Lithia Springs, a small town 17 miles west of Atlanta, sorting and repackaging boxes containing medical devices. She was convinced the symptoms were connected to the job. Pittman had applied to the position at the warehouse, run by the medical supply company ConMed, after learning about the opening from her fiancé, Derek Mitchell, who delivered products there. Every day she’d come home and complain to him about the mysterious aches and marks. At first, Mitchell tried to reassure her, guessing that the bruises were probably from bumping up against something. “I really didn’t think nothing of it,” he recalled.

Then, in the spring of 2019, came a surprising revelation. ConMed managers announced that the seemingly innocuous products in the boxes they were packaging had been sterilized with ethylene oxide, which the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers a carcinogen and is linked to lung and breast cancers as well as diseases of the nervous system. Suddenly, Pittman began connecting the dots between her symptoms and those of her colleagues. It would later emerge that at least 50 warehouse workers experienced a slew of health effects tied to ethylene oxide exposure, including seizures, vomiting, and trouble breathing. Ambulances were routinely called to the facility after workers collapsed, convulsed from seizures, or broke out in hives. Several — including Pittman — developed cancer.

Since ConMed came clean about the workers’ exposure to ethylene oxide, Pittman has suffered four strokes and had brain surgery. She’s currently undergoing chemotherapy for myeloma, according to multiple claims she has filed with the Georgia State Board of Workers’ Compensation for help paying her medical bills. After the second stroke, Mitchell was unable to care for her, and she moved in with her mother where she now lives. Mitchell and Pittman had planned to marry, but the $5,000 ring Mitchell purchased now sits collecting dust. “It just corrupted everything that she ever wanted to do in life,” said Mitchell. “She can’t talk, and she’s being fed through a tube.”

The ethylene oxide that Pittman and dozens of her coworkers were exposed to wasn’t supposed to have made it to the warehouse at all. At a sterilization plant 12 miles down the road, the chemical had been used to fumigate products before they were sent to the warehouse, a standard procedure for making sure that medical equipment is antiseptic and safe to use in hospitals across the country. More than 50 percent of all U.S. medical supplies are sterilized by ethylene oxide, due to the chemical’s unique ability to penetrate porous surfaces without causing damage. But over the past few years — beginning with findings by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, in 2019 and Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division, or EPD, in 2020 — regulators have learned that some amount of ethylene oxide travels out of sterilization facilities on the treated products. In the hours and weeks following application, the chemical evaporates, or off-gasses, turning the buildings where these products are stored into potentially significant sources of toxic air pollution — particularly for workers like Pittman who handled the boxes directly.

EDIT

https://grist.org/accountability/ethylene-oxide-georgia-medical-supply-warehouses-worker-health/

[Stargazer99]

1. I am tired of trying to make people understand that capitalism is a killer of the less powerful

Isn't it time to stop worshiping money and power? Respect for human life? Not in a Republican value system...maybe that is why they mouth out about the so called value they put on the pre-born

[dutch777]

2. Fact about many medical sterilants and sanitizers...they are carcinogenic, still in use and there is a reason why.

My last 12 years before retirement I worked in hospital administration on the facilities management side. Our housekeepers used a common major brand sanitizer for wiping down environmental surfaces in patient rooms and public spaces-- sinks, countertops, over bed tables, etc. It was advised that staff wore gloves while using the sanitizer. Come to find out that the product noted it was carcinogenic openly in its literature. Unfortunately, this was the only product found to be fully effective against C. Diff and some of the other bad bad bugs that lead to hospital acquired infections that are extremely difficult if not impossible to treat with currently available anti-biotics. We added new technology like UV light sanitizing to the anti-bug arsenal but the bugs out there now ARE THAT BAD that after looking at all the risks it was felt we needed to use everything at our disposal to combat the threat.

[hatrack]

3. Not surprised - evolution never stops.

.