2020-10-25 | Safety+Health Magazine: Personal protective equipment for women should be based on women’s sizes – not men’s. Why is this important? Because PPE that doesn’t fit correctly won’t adequately protect female
workers. To learn more, Safety+Health spoke with Melissa Black, CSP, president
of MsR3 LLC and adjunct faculty member at Columbia Southern University, about the trends she’s seeing in PPE for
women.
4 comments:
The problem that this article talks about is so real and so prevalent, I think I agreed with everything written in it. It is paramount that one’s PPE fits them properly, so as to make ensure utmost protection but sadly, that is not the case in a majority of places where such equipment is available.
I can slightly, very slightly, try to understand that the reason this practice could have started was that in the very first year or so with PPE, not a lot of people factored in the possibility of having women wear PPE given how they are almost always associated with relatively dangerous tasks or tasks that require safety. But the fact that it continues to date, for people to not be aware that this is an issue and that PPE, which is specifically designed for one’s own safety, is still made in men’s sizes and accepting females to be alright wearing them, neglecting their safety is just so unfair. I really hope that this practice will change as soon as possible
I am really disappointed that it took this long for there to be a push for PPE that was fitted to women’s bodies and sizes. The basic root for all of this really is who the PPE companies envision their products will be used for. And for a long time, the only people thought to be working in an environment in which they would need PPE were men, so the companies built to that. But there have always been women who need PPE, and more women are going into these industries all the time, so I would have thought that PPE for women would have been a market these companies would have wanted to get into. I am worried that as more PPE designed for women becomes available companies that are required to provide PPE for their employees will not stoke those items. They will probably be more expensive than PPE designed for men because items marked to women are often more expensive. So if women want PPE that fits them properly they will have to buy it on their own and that is not equitable.
It speaks volumes how just now there is has been a push for PPE fitted for women. I understand why it wasn’t for the first few years (maybe) as women were entering the workforce. It just does not make sense to a company to cater to a non-existent market. This is not to say that women do not deserve proper equipment, but there was not much to do about it. However, as more women have entered the field within technical direction and carpentry it is embarrassing it has taken this long for both companies and employers to realize a whole segment of their employees was not being properly protected. Working with machinery is dangerous, to varying degrees yes but dangerous nonetheless. I find it interesting however that for so long I heard the push toward “we need more women in *insert male-dominated field here*” but that, in reality, they were not prepared. In fact, so unprepared they were willing to hire women only to save face.
When I saw this article I immediately was like, “Well Duh.” Women should have PPE that is specific to them. But while I read the article, it just made me thing about what they were specifically referring to. The thing about PPE is that it is always about the fit and that is what you are always told. So, it makes actual sense that this is the case. But then I realized that every PPE I use is not able to be that specific. Like the difference in men’s faces alone would be a qualifying factor to make different versions of PPE for say a dust mask. But we all know that they make one dust mask, and that is it. Sure, there are different brands and maybe different sizes like large or small. But its all the same shape, proportionally. Then I thought about things like welding jackets, but I already know they make women’s versions, they are harder to find but they do exist. And realistically the fit does not matter, the coverage does, like in that scenario it could just be a blanket. It is not for other reasons but that is all that matters and often the jacket doesn’t fit all that great for anyone who wears it. But of course, this also goes to say that we should be talking about custom PPE as a whole for everyone and even more importantly that we put special emphasis on getting the appropriate PPE out into the world for women first because while I cannot think of any examples off the top of my head, it doesn’t mean that there aren’t any.
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