Chemical Safety

Concerning the health and safety legislation, we will go through specific subjects including the following: the legal basis according to which the European Union provides rules on health and safety at work; the integration of legislation with technical standards at the European and national level (EN and UNI Rules); the definitions and identifications of the individuals and entities involved in health and safety management in the workplace (the employer, the head of the protective and preventive services and its members, the workers' representative, the doctor on the workplace nominated by the employer; the producer of chemical substances): their exclusive duties and their cooperation; the risk assessment principles (exam of the working process, identification of risks and the criteria concerning their grading as more or less important); the design of the working environment focused on eliminating or minimizing risks (according to the "best available technology" standard instead of the "reasonably practicable" standard); specific rules concerning chemicals and its specific additional legislation: in particular the labeling standards and evaluation process of the chemical hazards under the REACH regulation.
The actual responsibilities of the employer also depend on the criteria that establish causation in the law. We will see how the degree of probability that is deemed necessary to state that a certain occupational factor has caused a damage is different in the civil and in the criminal setting. We will study what are the relationships between probability in science (epidemiology, chemistry and medicine) and causation in the law, by means of examples drawn from actual relevant cases. We will focus on the principles concerning the standard of good care and due diligence in civil and criminal law, that also have a relevant impact on chemical safety and liabilities.