HARD METALS DISEASE (TV)
Summary
Compiled from a series of Emmy Award-winning reports that appeared on "Today," this expose on hard-metals disease represents a four-year investigation into the lax and sometimes fraudulent safety practices of the Valenite Corporation. The program begins with information about the cobalt used in the machine-tool industry, which contaminates workers in a toxic powder form, causing the incurable and progressive hard-metals disease. In Syracuse, New York, two former Valenite factory workers, Bruce Ball and Frank Johnson, describe the wasting respiratory illness from which they and others are suffering. Ball states that Valenite abruptly closed the New York factory when workers began falling sick, and Johnson accuses the company of criminal negligence because its representatives did not inform workers of the toxic chemicals in the workplace or update safety standards, in spite of the documented connection between the chemicals and hard-metals disease. Unable to work at a normal job, Johnson conducts extensive research and compiles evidence concerning the causes of hard-metals disease and ValeniteÕs history of suppressing information about the unsafe conditions and toxic levels in its plants.
At the New York State legislature, Johnson lobbies to change the statute of limitations that prevents many workers from suing Valenite, and he begins his own campaign to run for Senate as a representative of the working class. Although the New York factory was closed, Valenite opened a new one in Riverside, California. Riverside workers, including Mary Mast Gurley, echo New York employeesÕ litany of respiratory conditions developed since they began working at Valenite, and Dr. Kathleen Ryan of the San Diego Medical Center explains the effects of cobalt on the lungs, refering to lung biopsies taken from Valenite workers. Next, former employees confront plant manager David West, who denies the hazards in the factory, and a group of workers travels to Mexicali, Mexico, the town into which Valenite moved its factory after the Riverside plant closed. In Mexico, Johnson and Gurley speak with employees on the grounds of the Valenite company, warning them of the hazardous conditions and describing the hard-metals disease resulting from exposure to cobalt. Both the plant manager and foreman of Valenite Syracuse then attest to the fact that the factory needed an emergency last-minute clean-up in order to pass an O.S.H.A inspection, and former Valenite workers in Caro, Michigan, meet to discuss the illness from which many of them are suffering; it has already killed one man in the community. Follow-up visits to Valenite employees in Syracuse, Riverside, Canada, and Mexicali are depicted next. In New York, although workers score a victory when the Valenite safety director is convicted by a federal court, they also suffer a loss when their peer Charlie Stevens dies of hard-metals disease. In Canada and Mexicali, an industrial hygienist fits sick Valenite employees with a device that checks levels of toxins in the air, and they find proof of unsafe conditions in the factories. In Riverside, a former employee is hospitalized due to a combination of lung damage from hard-metals disease and weakened bones from the steroid treatments for her disease. Finally, in Mexicali, while workers who spoke with the American press have been fired from Valenite, media attention has forced the company to improve its safety practices.
Preservation of the Post–World War II American Television Documentary Collection is supported in part by a Federal Save America’s Treasures grant administered by the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Details
- NETWORK: NBC
- DATE: November 30, 1986
- RUNNING TIME: 0:51:26
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: T:59726
- GENRE: Public Affairs/Documentaries
- SUBJECT HEADING: Industrial safety; Occupational diseases; Social responsibility of business; Corporations - corrupt practices
- SERIES RUN: NBC - TV, 1987
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Alpert, Jon (See also: Alpert, Jonny) … Reporter
- Karen Ranucci … Reporter
- De Leo, Maryann … Reporter
- Lillian Liberman … Reporter
- Bruce Ball
- Mary Mast Gurley
- Frank Johnson
- Kathleen Ryan
- Charlie Stevens