IIW History 1990-2015

environment. 5 This provided assistance to companies in the development of their own welding workshops and enabled the testing of different types of welding equipment available on the open market. It was the first initiative in Sweden to assist local companies in the selection of the most appropriate welding equipment and associated plant to minimise the risk to the health and safety of welding operatives, including consideration of danger to the health of other personnel working nearby. In this respect, flexible screens and fume extraction was in common use in fixed workplace situations but not in general industry, where welding often took place at non-stationary workplaces. There was also an interest in workplace design and the ergonomics of welding in this period balanced by demands for greater productivity in welding. For a long period, Prof. Dr-Ing. Roland Kadefors of the National Institute for Working Life in Göteborg, Sweden did a considerable amount of work on this and published many papers in the scientific literature. Information became readily available for example on studies of this nature through C-VIII. 6 Because of statements of cancer risk in welders

many studies had been completed by 1993 and it was concluded from the balance of these findings by C-VIII that welders, as a group, had a slightly higher risk of developing lung cancer than the general population and the risk, though slight, could not be neglected. 7 Dr Wolfgang Zschiesche (Germany), who was a medical doctor and long-standing member of C-VIII and became Chair in 2015, was to add that ‘…the studies do not show welding processes in general, or of a specific type, to be a definite cause of the increased cancer risk.

Wolfgang Zschiesche

Having said that, in some welding situations there is a potential for the fume to contain compounds of nickel, and or nickel/chromium that are known to cause cancer in processes other than in welding’. In recognition of this and the need to draw on knowledge from past experiences, C-VIII issued a statement in 1992 to all those responsible for health and safety of welders, calling on them to identify the constituents of the welding fume, reduce exposure to meet national standards, reduce exposure to chromium and nickel compounds in the fume and prevent exposure to asbestos. It was recommended to control exposure through the correct application of operational parameters, such as ventilation, personal protection and welder training, as well as encouraging and assisting welders not to smoke cigarettes. 8 The wording of this statement confirmed that reliance on anecdotal evidence alone, without greater medical knowledge and the development of correct precautions, could

HEALTH SAFETY & THE ENVIRONMENT