27 Engineered Stone Workers Dead From Silicosis In CA Alone In Six Years, So GOP Preparing To Protect Manufacturers [View all]

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At a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on what Republicans called “opportunistic” lawsuits filed against the energy-intensive engineered stone industry by injured workers, the differences between the concerns of America’s political parties could not have been clearer. Over the past several years, hundreds of U.S. workers have developed silicosis, a debilitating, often fatal but preventable occupational disease caused by inhaling silica dust. There are no effective treatments or cures for silicosis, which leaves workers struggling to breathe, coughing uncontrollably, progressively disabled and choosing between million-dollar lung transplants or death.

Those who work in the artificial stone industry face the greatest risk of exposure to silica dust, particularly when they prepare engineered stone slabs, formed by combining petroleum-based resins with pigments and pulverized crystalline silica, for installation. Twenty-seven artificial stone workers have died of silicosis since 2019 in California alone.

Yet the real victim, in the eyes of industry representatives and their Republican allies, is an industry that views workers’ efforts to recoup lost wages and budget-busting medical costs as an unjust money grab designed to bankrupt companies they say have no responsibility for how their products are cut, shaped and finished before installation.

“Our hearing this morning examines the troubling rise of abusive litigation against the U.S. stone slab industry,” Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said at the Wednesday hearing. Issa, who chairs the subcommittee and co-sponsored H.R. 5437, a bill that would shield artificial stone slab manufacturers from lawsuits, blamed “bad actor” firms that buy those products and skirt health and safety regulations as they prepare them for installation. He played a video showing how such “fabrication” shops could keep employees safe. The video was produced by the Cambria Co., the largest domestic manufacturer of artificial stone slabs.

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https://insideclimatenews.org/news/17012026/house-republicans-discuss-protections-for-artificial-stone-workers/