March 2025 Occupational Health Watch: New Dashboard Tracks Engineered Stone Silicosis in California

Details

• Journal Article:
  Occupational Health Watch
• Corporate Authors:
  California Department of Public Health
• Description:
  Silicosis is a progressive, incurable, and sometimes fatal lung disease caused by inhaling crystalline silica dust. Silicosis has become increasingly prevalent among workers who fabricate engineered stone countertops and are exposed to high levels of silica dust when cutting, grinding, and polishing engineered stone. Workers with silicosis associated with engineered stone tend to be much younger compared with workers with silicosis from other types of silica exposures. The California Department of Public Health (CDPH) Occupational Health Branch (OHB) has conducted statewide tracking of engineered stone silicosis since 2019 and has identified 259 confirmed cases as of 3/19/2025, including 15 deaths and 30 workers who have received lung transplants. Tracking data is essential for documenting the risks, trends, and burden of silicosis. Multiple stakeholders, including local health jurisdictions, Cal/OSHA, the media, health care providers, and others regularly request updates on the number of cases and disease outcomes. In order to make updated data publicly available, CDPH OHB has released an online dashboard that tracks confirmed silicosis cases related to engineered stone in the state. The dashboard will be updated weekly, and includes the numbers of cases, transplants, and deaths, the year that cases were identified, case demographics, and the geographic distribution of cases in the state. In addition to the dashboard, other silicosis resources are available on the program website. Description provided by NIOSH
• Subjects:
  • Occupational Health
  • Safety
  • Silicon Dioxide
  • Silicosis
• Keywords:
  • Engineered stone
  • Stone products
  • Countertops
  • Silicosis
  • Surveillance
  • Silica dusts
  • Quartz
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Cooperative Agreement
• Genre:
  Newsletter
• Place as Subject:
  California ; San Francisco Region OSHA
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  1 pdf page
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20071841
• Citation:
  Occupational Health Watch: March 2025. Richmond, CA: California Department of Public Health, 2025 Mar; :1
• Email:
  OHW@cdph.ca.gov
• CAS Registry Number:
  • Quartz (SiO2) (CAS RN 14808-60-7)
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2025
• Performing Organization:
  Public Health Institute
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  2005/07/01
• End Date:
  2026/06/30
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/260063/cdc_260063_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 60.47 KB]
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:b69dfd9a3ea3fbfda5bb2deb03003810aae44f142761b51373d4201f1e2b00f570065290b51f10d52d3acc8f421568d58cfb4543b8241b3e8f6afbee77315c89