1. WORKING FOR A HEALTHY FUTURE
Current Trends and an Exploration of the
Future of the Regulatory Framework Impacting
Exposure Assessment in the Semiconductor
Industry in the UK
John W Cherrie
INSTITUTE OF OCCUPATIONAL MEDICINE . Edinburgh . UK www.iom-world.org

2. Summary…
• Health and safety has a low priority with the UK
government
• Inspection of the industry
• New guidance on good control practice
• New general initiatives in Europe
• Shift working

3. A war on health and safety
• David Cameron is ”…waging war against
the excessive health and safety culture
that has become an albatross around
the neck of British businesses.”
• And he wants to “…to kill off the health
and safety culture for good. I want 2012
to go down in history not just as
…the year we get a lot of this pointless
time-wasting out of the British economy
and British life once and for all.”

4. HSE inspections…
• Twenty five semiconductor manufacture sites were
inspected between February and May 2002
• Standards were comparable to other manufacturing sectors
• Companies with high levels of compliance had effective
systems to manage health and safety
• March and September 2009 there were 17
medium/large sized semiconductor companies
inspected
• Little had changes since the previous inspection visits
• Report published… www.hse.gov.uk/engineering/semiconductor-
manufacturers-report.pdf

5. Conclusions/recommendations…
• Improved technology has reduced likelihood of exposure to
hazardous substances
• Senior management commitment sometimes needs to be
translated into effective control
• Need more focus on exposure of maintenance, cleaning etc.
• „Compliance monitoring‟ of high hazard situations, was
weak at several sites
• Poor use of occupational health services
• Few companies had satisfactory auditing
• High level, corporate oversight was often largely
concentrated on safety rather than health

6. COSHH Essentials
• HSEs way to work with industry to raise standards
• MC0 - Advice for managers
• MC1 - Wet etch processing
• MC2 - Chemical vapour deposition (CVD)
• MC3 - Dry etch processing
• MC4 - Molecular beam epitaxy
• MC5 - Photolithography processing
• MC6 - Ion implantation
• Available
at…www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/guidance/mcseries.ht
m

8. HSEs view…
• Following the 2009 report, industry accepted the
recommendations and agreed to work towards
their implementation
• HSE will continue to work with this industry
through the Microelectronics Joint Working Group
to influence their activity and monitor
implementation
• The assessment of cancer burden in Britain does
not highlight risks in the semiconductor industry

9. New general requirements
• A new European Directive covering all
musculoskeletal disorders/ergonomic risks
• EMF Directive
• „New Directive with revised exposure limits and partial
exemptions‟
• Proposed amendment to the Carcinogens and
Mutagens Directive
• A new EU Occupational Safety and Health
Strategy
• More focus on diseases rather than accidents, particularly
carcinogens

10. Shift working…
• Shift working involving night work needs careful
management
Hansen J, Stevens RG. Case-control study of shift-work and breast cancer risk in
Danish nurses: Impact of shift systems. Eur J Cancer. 2011 Aug. 16. 1–8.