Hazard Evaluation and Risk Assessment

Session 2Laboratory Safety Training

What is Risk?The potential for realization of unwanted, adverse consequences to human life, health, property, or the environment; estimation of risk is usually based on the expected value of the conditional probability of the event occurring times the consequence of the event given that it has occurred.

Risk analysisA detailed examination including risk assessment, risk evaluation, and risk management alternatives, performed to understand the nature of unwanted, negative consequences to human life, health, property, or the environment; an analytical process to provide information regarding undesirable events; the process of quantification of the probabilities and expected consequences for identified risks.

Risk assessment The process of establishing information regarding acceptable levels of a risk and/or levels of risk for an individual, group, society, or the environment.

Risk estimation The scientific determination of the characteristics of risks, usually in as quantitative a way as possible. These include the magnitude, spatial scale, duration and intensity of adverse consequences and their associated probabilities as well as a description of the cause and effect links

Risk evaluationA component of risk assessment in which judgments are made about the significance and acceptability of risk

Risk identification Recognizing that a hazard exists and trying to define its characteristics. Often risks exist and are even measured for some time before their adverse consequences are recognized. In other cases, risk identification is a deliberate procedure to review, and it is hoped, anticipate possible hazards.

Safety Relative protection from adverse consequences.

HazardA condition or physical situation with a potential for an undesirable consequence, such as harm to life or limb.

Hazard assessmentAn analysis and evaluation of the physical, chemical and biological properties of the hazard.

New of culture of Chemical SafetyPublic opinion of chemicals has changed over the last 25 years.Love Canal 1977.Designation of Superfund Sites.Community Right to Know laws.Cradletograve management of wastes

Culture of chemical safety cont.On Dec. 3, 1984, a Union Carbide industrial plant in Bhopal, India, released a deadly cloud of the gas methyl isocyanate into the air, killing at least 6,500 people.OSHAs Process Safety Management

Annual Risk of Death in the US

HazardNumber of deaths/million personsAll Causes9,000.0Motor Vehicle Accidents210.0Work Accidents150.0Homicides93.0Drowning37.0Poisonings17.0Boating0.6Tornadoes0.4Bites and Stings0.2

Annual Risk of Death in the US

Hazard Number of deaths/million personsMotor Vehicle Accidents210.0Work Accidents150.0Homicides93.0Drowning37.0Poisonings17.0Boating0.6Tornadoes0.4Bites and Stings0.2

RISK COMPARISONS FOR INVOLUNTARY RISKS

Risk Risk of Death / Person / YearInfluenza1 in 5000Leukemia 1 in 12,500Struck by Automobile1 in 20,000Floods1 in 455,000Tornadoes (Midwest)1 in 455,000Earthquakes (California)1 in 588,000Nuclear Power Plant1 in 10 millionMeteorite1 in 100 billion

CONCEPT OF DE MINIMIS RISKDe minimis risks are those risks judged to be too small to be of social concern, or too small to justify the use of risk management resources for control.

The De minimis risk level frequently used by government agencies (EPA, FDA) is 1 in 1,000,000 or 1 in a million increased risk of an adverse effect occurring over a 70 year lifetime in a large population.

CONCEPT OF DE MINIMIS RISKThe 1 in a million risk level used to regulate some chemicals and other hazards is many times below risks which people face every day.

Reality checkThere is no point in getting into a panic about the risks of life until you have compared the risks which worry you with those that dont, but perhaps should. (Lord Rothschild, The Wall Street Journal, 1979).

RISKS THAT INCREASE PROBABILITY OF DEATH BY ONE IN A MILLIONActivityCause of DeathSmoking 1.4 CigarettesCancer, Heart DiseaseTraveling 10 miles by BicycleAccidentTraveling 300 miles by CarAccidentFlying 1000 miles by JetAccidentOne Chest X-RayCancer from RadiationLiving 150 years withinCancer from Radiation 20 miles of a Nuclear Power PlantRisk of Accident by Living Cancer from Radiation within 5 Miles of a NuclearReactor for 50 yrs

Principal Elements of Risk AssessmentAnticipationRecognitionEvaluation

Risk Assessment vs. Risk ManagementAnticipation, Recognition and Evaluation are Risk Assessment

Control is Risk Management

Risk is an Equal Functionof Toxicity and ExposureParacelsus Understood Risk AssessmentRisk = Toxicity X DoseExposure =DoseRisk = Toxicity X Dose

Ensuring Safe Laboratories These thought processes must occur prior to conducting all laboratory research.