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schemingreader (![[info]](http://www.journalfen.net/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} schemingreader) wrote,@ 2007-09-05 14:38:00 |
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Labor Day in the US was on Monday
I am at work today, of course. I have my homepage on my browser set to Google, and I get links to news stories from that page. I was expecting that someone would get sick from eating microwave popcorn as soon as I read that it was a health risk for workers. Here is a link list about so-called "popcorn lung." You really won't believe this, but it's been several years that workers have been trying to get compensation for respiratory illnesses they got from spraying butter flavoring on microwave popcorn.
It would be funny if it weren't so incredibly horrible. The chemical flavoring caused workers to lose the ability to breathe. The manufacturers, International Flavors and Fragrances, tested the flavoring on rats--who died.
What makes it extra bad is that the US government knew that this additive was causing workers to develop lung ailments, but they didn't make it illegal. Now, FINALLY, we are seeing the illness in a consumer.
Obviously, folks, stop buying butter-flavored popcorn--but that's not my main message. My main message is that I live in a country where the right to NOT DIE at work is seriously abridged. We have known that this chemical was dangerous since it was introduced in 1993! But we didn't care, because it looked like it was only a problem for the people spraying it onto popcorn, not the people eating the popcorn.
I am at work today, of course. I have my homepage on my browser set to Google, and I get links to news stories from that page. I was expecting that someone would get sick from eating microwave popcorn as soon as I read that it was a health risk for workers. Here is a link list about so-called "popcorn lung." You really won't believe this, but it's been several years that workers have been trying to get compensation for respiratory illnesses they got from spraying butter flavoring on microwave popcorn.
It would be funny if it weren't so incredibly horrible. The chemical flavoring caused workers to lose the ability to breathe. The manufacturers, International Flavors and Fragrances, tested the flavoring on rats--who died.
What makes it extra bad is that the US government knew that this additive was causing workers to develop lung ailments, but they didn't make it illegal. Now, FINALLY, we are seeing the illness in a consumer.
Obviously, folks, stop buying butter-flavored popcorn--but that's not my main message. My main message is that I live in a country where the right to NOT DIE at work is seriously abridged. We have known that this chemical was dangerous since it was introduced in 1993! But we didn't care, because it looked like it was only a problem for the people spraying it onto popcorn, not the people eating the popcorn.
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