A Forward Stride in Occupational Health

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JF MAN and his environment are to be comprehended as an entity, rather than as separate and conflicting systems, those who are expert in the study of man and those who are expert in the study of environment must work in close association. Perhaps nowhere is this more essential than in the field of occupational health, which is such an important component of environmental health. The question is sometimes asked: Why, when provision has been made for intensive study of the health aspects of air, water, food, and radiation, is it necessary to set up another study category-occupational health-which to some extent involves all these other areas? The answer is, of course, that man doesn't organize his various activities within the neat classifications of the physical scientist. Work is as characteristic of man as flight of a bird. Man clusters around his occupations in definable groups set in definable environments. Within these groupings, he encounters special stresses, performs special activities, and develops special interactions. Far from merely duplicating studies of air, water, food, and radiation, occupational health cuts a revealing cross section which is not merely valuable but essential for comprehension in depth of the natural interactions between the basic environmental factors. That such interactions preexist, and have strong needs and claims of their own for separate investigation, is fortunate indeed. Occupational health is concerned with that part of the individual's total health which is closely associated with his employment. But the development of occupational health as an entity is dictated by many factors. Employment presents special environmental influences and risks. The worker's life revolves around the central focus of his work. Employment creates groups of people whose health can be observed over specific periods of time. Health enters importantly into employeremployee relationships, and the products of industry in turn affect wide segments of the general population. Furthermore, it is becoming increasingly difficult to disassociate occupational health from environmental health. Workers spend some 40 hours a week on the job as compared with 128 hours off it. Not only have the health effects of the off-duty environment increased over the decades as the hours of the workweek have diminished; in today's world, off-duty health risks are sometimes greater for workers than on-duty risks. One of the first groups in this country to undertake research in the field of occupational health was, logically enough, the Public Health Service. Its first studies were made in 1910 in the mining and steel industries. These were followed by investigations of unsanitary conditions and high tuberculosis rates among garment workers. In 1914, the Service established, in Washington, a special health activity for the prevention and control of disease of occupational origin. It was called the Office of Industrial Hygiene Dr. Anderson is Assistant Surgeon General and chief, Bureau of State Services, Public Health Service. This paper is excerpted from a talk presented on October 8, 1962, at the open house ceremonies held in Cincinnati, Ohio, on completion of the expansion and remodeling of a Public Health Service Occupational Health Research and Training Facility.