01/25/2023
Wes, from T.A.C.T. Houston, your friendly neighborhood biohazard guy here with a safety message. Recently we have gone to several locations and spoken to hotel and multi family staff. We were told management had asked them to clean up a crime scene with blood or other biohazard. That poses a serious health risk to employees and anyone else entering the contaminated area, not to mention the possible fines from OSHA. Here is an excerpt from OSHA 19.10, 10.20.
If you need any type of biohazard cleanup in or around Harris County, it is crucial that you use an OSHA-certified cleanup team.
Did you know that it is a violation for employers to expose their employees to blood-borne pathogens? Exposure to blood-borne pathogen hazards can result in serious or life-threatening illnesses.
OSHA states that violations in which an employer either knowingly failed to comply with a legal requirement (purposeful disregard) or acted with plain indifference to employee safety is considered a willful violation.
Without proper protective equipment, training and an employer safety plan in place, it is a violation of OSHA regulations to place your employees in these types of cleanup situations:
• Blood cleanup or handling• F***s or Urine cleanup or handling
• Needles or Sharps cleanups or disposal or handling
• ANY bodily fluids cleanup or handling
While it might seem easier to allow employees, such as your janitorial staff, to handle the cleanup, these individuals lack the training necessary to fully ensure that the area is remediated properly. It’s also highly unlikely that your team has the necessary gear, including respirators, gloves, protective coveralls and so forth.
Additionally, the typical products used for cleaning by your janitorial staff are not adequate for biohazard cleanup. The T.A.C.T. Houston Team uses a three-tiered chemical system for biohazard cleanup that kills gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria.
This includes bacteria such as Salmonella enterica, Staphylococcus aureus, Methicillin Resistant S. aureus (MRSA) and E. coli. Our virucidal agent works against Influenza A, H1N1 Influenza A, Influenza A Avian virus, HIV, Rhinovirus type 37 and is a fungicidal against Trichophyton mentagrophytes, Aspregillus niger and Canada albicans.
Of course, violating OSHA regulations is directly related to your employees’ safety, and these violations also can cost your company a lot of money in fines, potential lawsuits, and lost work time for workplace injuries related to violations.
While keeping employees safe should be the main consideration, there’s no getting around the fact that violating OSHA regulations can be quite costly for companies. For instance, if any employees are injured due to violations, this costs the company lost work time.
If lawsuits are filed due to violations, the results of these lawsuits also can be quite expensive. Furthermore, OSHA fines companies that aren’t in compliance with safety regulations, and these fines can be higher than you might think. In fact, OSHA increased fines in 2017, here’s a quick look at what you might face:
• $12,675 maximum penalty per violation of serious or other-than-serious posting requirements
• $12,675 maximum penalty per day for failure to abate, or failure to fix or improve, beyond the initial abatement date
• $126,749 maximum penalty for willful or repeat violations
Just recently OSHA fined the United States Postal Service $342,000 after inspectors found workers repeatedly were exposed to packages labeled as biohazards without safety standards in practice, OSHA certifications, and the proper documentation of training and safety planning.
Can your business afford $350,000 in safety violation fines?
Can your business afford the bad press of an employee complaint or lawsuit with regards to exposure?
Hiring professionals just makes sense. The T.A.C.T. Houston Team is OSHA-certified and certified with Public Department of Health to handle and transport medical waste and many other biohazards. The T.A.C.T. Houston Team also can issue a certificate of treatment or remediation for proof of proper cleanup should the need arise, so you won’t have to worry about OSHA compliance.
In many cases, biohazard cleanup is covered by insurance, so it’s possible that there will be little to no out-of-pocket costs for you to incur. We have worked extensively with all major insurance carriers, and we can file the claim on your behalf and take care of any submission documents, including an inventory of any biohazard-contaminated items.
Our team provides complete biohazard cleanup in Houston and all surrounding areas. We also can provide you with professional chemical cleanup services. No matter what hazardous materials you need to remove from a property, The T.A.C.T. Houston Team can help. We are available 24/7/365 and can mobilize a team quickly to any point in and around Houston.
