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NIOSH

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) is the federal research agency that studies workplace hazards and recommends limits and protective measures to prevent occupational illness and injury. Unlike OSHA, NIOSH doesn't write or enforce regulations. It produces the scientific evidence and exposure recommendations that inform them. NIOSH has studied asbestos disease in workers since the agency's earliest years.

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Origin

NIOSH was created by the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, the same law that created OSHA, and was placed within what is now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) rather than the Department of Labor. This separation was deliberate: Congress wanted an independent scientific body to research workplace hazards without the political pressures of rule-making.

Significance in Asbestos Context

NIOSH's published Recommended Exposure Limits (RELs), criteria documents, and Health Hazard Evaluations (HHEs) are frequently used as evidence that employers and manufacturers knew, or should have known, about asbestos dangers at particular times. The 1972 and 1976 NIOSH asbestos criteria documents are especially important because they pushed for lower exposure limits years before OSHA adopted them, undercutting industry claims of scientific uncertainty. NIOSH also administers the B Reader certification program for radiologists who interpret chest films for asbestos-related disease, and many of the doctors who read your imaging may hold this credential. If you worked at a site that received a NIOSH Health Hazard Evaluation, that report can be a powerful piece of exposure documentation in your case.

OSHA, Recommended Exposure Limit (REL), Health Hazard Evaluation, B Reader, Permissible Exposure Limit (PEL), State of the Art

Notes

  • Ask your attorney to search the NIOSH HHE database (available on the CDC website) for any evaluations conducted at workplaces where you were exposed. These reports often name specific products, processes, and measured fiber levels.
  • If your chest imaging was interpreted for asbestos-related findings, ask whether the reader is NIOSH-certified as a B Reader; this credential carries significant weight in both medical and legal settings.
  • Preserve any NIOSH publications, criteria documents, or correspondence you encountered during employment, especially safety bulletins, training materials, or industrial hygiene reports that reference NIOSH guidance.
  • NIOSH historical documents on asbestos (particularly 1972, 1976, and 1980 publications) are commonly used to establish what was knowable about asbestos hazards at the time you were exposed.

People

People the documents tie to NIOSH, most often named first, with the titles the documents give them.

In our library

3 documents in our library name NIOSH, by collection.

JM Knowledge Chronology (1)

Motley 1000 (1)

Other library documents (1)

In the Union Carbide documents

NIOSH is named in 357 Union Carbide documents dated 1971 to 1989 (1 as the source, 357 mentioned), from asbestos lawsuits over Union Carbide's Calidria asbestos. 350 of them are published in our collection.

And 200 more documents.

Names in the documents

The spellings documents use for NIOSH, OCR misreadings included, so a search for any of them finds this page: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health · National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) · National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health · National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) · USPHS/NIOSH · National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Department of Health and Human Services · National Institute of Occupational Safety & Health (NIOSH) · National Institute of Occupational Safety & Health · NIOSH (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health) · NIOSH/HEW · National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health · National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), U.S. Public Health Service · National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health (NIOSH) · NIOSH (National Institute of Occupational Safety & Health) · MSHA/NIOSH · Dept. of Health, Education & Welfare - National Institute of Occupational Safety & Health (NIOSH) · NIOSH-MESA · Mining and Minerals Section, NIOSH · NIOSH Division of Respiratory Disease Studies · NIOSH Division of Surveillance, Hazard Evaluations, and Field Studies · NIOSH Testing and Certification Branch, Appalachian Laboratory for Occupational Safety and Health · Division of Training/NIOSH · NIOSH Division of Training · Engineering Control Technology Branch, Division of Physical Sciences and Engineering, NIOSH · MESA-NIOSH · NIOSH Board of Scientific Counselors · NIOSH-Proficiency Analytical Testing Program.

Where this comes from

This page brings together every document in our library that names NIOSH, across collections. Titles and affiliations are taken from the documents themselves, and units and subsidiaries are grouped under the company they belong to.

Mentioned on this site

Cite this page

“NIOSH.” AsbestosClaims.Law Library. https://asbestosclaims.law/library/organizations/niosh.

ACL Doc numbers and their short links never change. See how to cite the Library.

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This page is provided for general informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice. Every asbestos case turns on its own facts, exposure history, diagnosis, deadlines, available evidence, and applicable law. Reviewing this page does not create an attorney-client relationship. For advice about your specific situation, call 833-4-ASBESTOS for a free case review.