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Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] Best Safety Apps?
Date: Wednesday, August 13, 2014 1:22:59 PM
Author: "Secretary, ACS Division of Chemical Health and Safety" <secretary**At_Symbol_Here**DCHAS.ORG> 		Next by Date:
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] "labcandy"
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2014 18:07:58 +0000
Author: "Alnajjar, Mikhail S"

From: Jeffrey Lewin <jclewin**At_Symbol_Here**MTU.EDU>
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] "labcandy"
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2014 13:41:49 -0400
Reply-To: DCHAS-L <DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**MED.CORNELL.EDU>
Message-ID: CAEwQnqjc2RR8-rrrZEs5te_jJE=Ba7qsOdmSEmCEiw4ZgY31AQ**At_Symbol_Here**mail.gmail.com
In-Reply-To <046a01cfb704$349a66c0$9dcf3440$**At_Symbol_Here**toast.net>


I've been reading this from the beginning and have written responses, in my head, many times...with different endings...

Initially, my thoughts were that if a little color can break the "nerd" barrier, why not. And, as a bonus, if it looks "cool" they are more likely to wear when they need it. After all most PPE isn't a one color or design that fit all: all sorts of protective shoes, brand name eye wear, hard hats with logos, hard hats that look like cowboy hats exist in the safety catalogs. Walk into any dentist, doctors or even a veterinary office and you'll see all manner of scrubs and "medical style" wear. I run a high school biology competition where we provide the appropriate PPE as needed but students are allowed to bring lab coats if they wish. Every year a group will bring their own coats that are almost always personalize with everything from simple names on the back to tie dyed.

That said, I'm not particularly excited about this specific group. Everything from its name to its web page's "homemade" video suggest this is really about fashion and not science. Yes, the web page does give some lip service to talking with girls about science, but the pictures suggest otherwise (many which I would flag as inappropriate - a young girl looking through a test tube of yellow liquid with no eye protection, shots of girls surrounded by (presumably non-hazardous, but we don't know) beakers of liquids, with only some of them wearing eye protection). The lab does not make a good runway.

I do have one concern from a safety perspective. White implies "clean." It also makes it easier for spills to be seen. Wearing a multicolored lab coat would have a tendency to hide spills, wouldn't it?

Jeff


On Wed, Aug 13, 2014 at 10:38 AM, Ernie Lippert <ernielippert**At_Symbol_Here**toast.net> wrote:
"Good grief" said Charlie Brown, I never knew it was so bad!
Consider this syllogism:
All women look good in black,
And judges wear black robes,
Therefor all girls should go to law school and become judges.

According to wicki, less than a third of all judges in the United States are
women. There is a lot wrong with this whole subject on many different
levels. I thought people went into chemistry/science because of an innate
desire to understand the workings of nature. I didn't know it was
color-coordinated!
Regards,
Ernie Lippert

-----Original Message-----
From: DCHAS-L Discussion List [mailto:dchas-l**At_Symbol_Here**MED.CORNELL.EDU] On Behalf Of
Ralph B. Stuart
Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2014 12:27 AM
To: DCHAS-L**At_Symbol_Here**MED.CORNELL.EDU
Subject: Re: [DCHAS-L] "labcandy"

> >Until this thread started I had never even thought of labcoats being
"men's" clothing, it was just a labcoat. >Now I know better, I guess I
should probably feel bad about being a woman wearing "men's" clothes(?)

At the DCHAS technical sessions today, the person from the University of
California system reported that one of the big lessons learned from their
recent PPE program rollout was the importance of having labcoats fitted for
female wearing. Their experience is that many new hazards were created by
poorly fitting labcoats and eye protection and a good program has to fit the
equipment to the person wearing it.

- Ralph

Ralph Stuart, CIH
Chemical Hygiene Officer
Cornell University
rstuart**At_Symbol_Here**cornell.edu



--
Jeff Lewin
Departmental Laboratory Supervisor
Biological Sciences
Michigan Technological University

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