Child-resistant cigarette lighters in the United States

Abstract

On July 12,1993, the U.S Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) published a mandatory safety standard requiring disposable and novelty cigarette lighters to be child-resistant. Annually in the United States, children under 5 years of age playing with lighters cause more than 5,000 residential fires, resulting in approximately 150 deaths and more than 1,000 injuries. The standard is expected to prevent about 100 of those fire-related deaths each year. The standard includes labeling, testing, recordkeeping, and reporting requirements for manufacturers and importers. The standard applies to lighters manufactured in the United States or imported after July 11, 1994.

A study of actual child-play fire incidents was conducted as part of the initial work on the project to develop a safety standard. The major objectives of the study were:

1) to determine the age and sex of the children starting the fires, 2) to establish the methods the children used to operate the lighters, and 3) to identify the types of lighters involved. The study was conducted by CPSC field staff with the help of fire departments around the United States. Two hundred seventy-seven fires were investigated. Major findings of the study included

? Disposable butane lighters were involved in the majority of the fires.

? The children starting the fires were primarily 3 and 4 years old.

? Male children starting the fires outnumbered female children by a ratio of 4 to 1.

? Most children used two hands to operate the lighters.

Based on the analysis of the study results, the CPSC staff concluded that child-resistant lighters could be an effective means of addressing the risk of injury and death associated with child-play fires.     

东莞市废品回收站的安全管理现状及对策

在对东莞市再生资源回收管理模式、人员状况、回收站建设等情况进行调研和详细分析的基础上，针对其再生资源回收站点的环境、消防安全方面存在的二次污染，火灾隐患等问题，提出改善回收站点环境、消防安全状况的对策和建议。     

从利比亚跨国撤离事件谈对外工程承包的安全风险及对策

从利比亚跨国撤离事件入手，在对利比亚铁路项目进行简单介绍的基础上，针对国际承包工程过程中可能遭遇的安全风险的影响，及如何避免这种国际安全风险或在面临国际安全风险时如何更好地保障安全、减少经济损失，提出相应的防范手段和解决对策。     

浅议全面质量管理在企业安全管理的应用

在企业实施全面质量管理不仅对企业的产品与服务质量管控有重要意义,同时对企业安全生产管理也可产生显著推动作用。本文在介绍全面质量管理基本原则的基础上,总结对比两者的相似性,并结合在某生产型企业建立安全生产管理体系的经验,论述将全面质量管理理念应用于企业安全生产管理的可行过程,以期达到迅速有效建立安全生产管理体系并有效平稳运行、形成企业安全管理文化与标准的效果,促进企业质量管理与安全管理水平提升。     

Current activites in the field of child safety within CEN aand ISO

Abstract

Many countries have implemented safety and performance requirements for children's products. There is, however, a need to harmonize existing legislation and standards to facilitate a uniform flow of trade. At the same time, it is essential to extend existing requirements to restrict certain hazards which have not been covered in the past.

In CEN, the European Committee for standardization, several technical committees are developing European Standards for products to be used by or for children. On a global level as well, within ISO, there are standardization projects covering such products.

Child safety is the main objective for the standardization work on:

?Safety of toys (CENATC 52, ISO/TC 181)

? Child use and care articles (CEN/TC 252)

?Playground equipment for children LCEN/TC 136/SC 1)

? Children's furniture (CEN/TC 207, ISO/TC 136(

?Child-resistant packaging (CEN/TC 261/SC 2, ISO/TC 122) Children's products constitute a group of consumer products with large variations between the different products. Nevertheless, since they all come in contact with children (and their parents), several hazards associated with these products are similar for the various products. This is reflected in the work of CEN/TC 252, Child use and care articles, established in 1990.

To establish a horizontal framework for the hazard-based approach, CEN/ TC 252 created a working group with the task to specify general and common safety requirements (WG 6). Five working groups started the elaboration of product standards in parallel.

The traditional concept of a standardization project was found inadequate and other solutions were sought. Finally, it was decided to combine the results from working group 6 into one guidance document, to be published as a CEN Report.     

Valuing consumer safety

Snowboarding is quickly becoming a popular sport at alpine resorts. In contrast to alpine skiing, where injuries to the knee and thumb are most common, the wrist (and forearm) and ankle are the most frequently injured body regions for snowboarders. Unfortunately, the rapid international growth of the sport has not been matched by detailed epidemiological evaluation of the injuries specific to snowboarding or the countermeasures to prevent them. The aim of this paper is to critically review the literature describing injury prevention measures, or countermeasures, for snowboarding. In doing so, it provides an evaluation of the extent to which these countermeasures have been demonstrated to be effective or associated with the occurrence of new types of injuries. Few countermeasures specific for snowboarding were found to have been formally evaluated. The countermeasures to which some attention has been paid are boots, bindings, wrist guards, skill level and methods of falling. Skill level and the other injury countermeasures apply more generally across the sport. Recommendations for countermeasure implementation include: education for snowboarders, adherence to snow conduct and safety codes, preparing snowboarders for their activity and maintenance of parks and runs. Recommendations for improved data collections include: standardising and maintaining existing data collections, collecting information about equipment used by snowboarders and monitoring injury trends. Further biomechanical and epidemiological research needs to be undertaken on knee/ankle and wrist/forearm injuries. Evaluation of countermeasures needs to keep pace with the rapid developments in this field. Particular attention should be directed towards evaluations of the role of wristguards, boots/bindings, fall technique and lessons in preventing injuries. Given the rapidly increasing popularity of the sport, the need for the safety equipment to be evaluated would seem to be a priority, along with identification of the mechanisms of injury.     

Product design and tort law: Safety implications of increasing similarity in civil liability and regulatory standards

This article addresses the impact of changes in design defect tort law on safety in the European Union and the United States, and draws two conclusions bearing significant product safety implications. First, tort law’s approach to design defectiveness is developing more cohesion. Although important differences in jurisdictional approaches remain, the differences appear to be diminishing rather than growing. In both the United States and the European Union, courts are increasingly relying upon a risk/utility balancing test to determine whether to impose civil liability for allegedly defective product designs. Second, the direction in which tort law is evolving is bringing it closer to defectiveness tests typically employed by government regulatory agencies in Europe and the United States. Civil liability standards are increasingly similar to regulatory standards used in determining whether a product should be allowed on the market at all. This trend toward greater cohesion in tort standards, and tort law’s increasing similarity to regulatory standards, has both positive and negative implications for safety. On the whole, the trend is likely desirable – it should encourage efficient products that are closer to an optional blend of safety and utility.     

Measuring the road safety performance of Iranian provinces: a double-frontier DEA model and evidential reasoning approach

Abstract

Road traffic accidents are critical public issue in developing countries, and they annually waste a significant amount of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In order to urgently consider how this problem is related to the current policies, a proper safety evaluation of regional programmes in crash reduction is fundamental to the governments. The current research aims to employ a double-frontier Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model to assess the productivity of Iranian regional safety programmes in reducing the number of road fatalities. The safety efficiencies of Iranian provinces are simultaneously estimated using the double frontier DEA to reflect both the optimistic and pessimistic points of view. Then, the Evidential Reasoning (ER) approach is applied to aggregate the obtained efficiency values. These provinces are ranked based on the data panel for 2014–2016. Finally, a double-frontier Malmquist productivity index (MPI) is used to comprehensively measure the safety performance of Iranian roads over a period of time.     

Workplace risks and stressors as predictors of burnout: The moderating impact of job control and team efficacy

Air medical healthcare (AMH) professionals care for critically-ill individuals while conveying them to healthcare centres from distant, and frequently dangerous, locations. AMH professionals experience additional health and safety issues beyond the “typical” stressors faced by other healthcare professionals. Therefore, we integrated the safety and psychosocial health literatures to examine the relationship between workplace stressors (risk perception, worries, and patient-care barriers) and two components of burnout (emotional exhaustion; depersonalization), and the moderating impact of job control and team efficacy for 106 Canadian AMH professionals. Worries over medical hassles and barriers to patient care uniquely predicted emotional exhaustion. Lack of perceived control over one's job was related to exhaustion and depersonalization after controlling for stressors. Job control and team efficacy buffered some of the stressor-burnout relationships. Copyright © 2009 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

路桥工程管理综合分析探讨

路桥施工管理与其他施工相同,其本质主要是工程现场管理,工程现场管理的质量的优质直接决定了工程能否优质、高效完成。文章主要对路桥施工过程现场普遍存在的问题分析探讨,从而找出解决问题的有效途径。