STAND. COM. REP. NO.510
Honolulu, Hawaii
, 2001
RE: H.B. No. 790
H.D. 1
Honorable Calvin K.Y. Say
Speaker, House of Representatives
Twenty-First State Legislature
Regular Session of 2001
State of Hawaii
Sir:
Your Committees on Health and Labor and Public Employment, to which was referred H.B. No. 790 entitled:
"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO HEALTH CARE WORKER INJURY PREVENTION,"
beg leave to report as follows:
The purpose of this bill is to protect nurses and other health care workers from needlestick and other sharps-related injuries.
The Department of Labor and Industrial Relations, Hawaii Nurses Association, and the Hawaii Government Employees Association submitted testimony in support of the measure with proposed amendments. The Department of Health supported the intent of the measure.
Your Committees recognize that needlestick injuries and sharps-related accidents are an unacceptable risk to millions of health care workers every year. Moreover, these injuries can transmit diseases such as HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis C, Hepatitis B, and at least twenty other bloodborne pathogens, many of which are fatal.
Technology has been developed to prevent or greatly reduce the risks of these types of injuries. However, many health care facilities continue to use older devices that do not offer similar types of protection.
The bill references tasks that are impossible to complete, are unnecessary, or are already being performed. Accordingly, your Committees have amended this measure by:
(1) Requiring Hawaii's employers to provide additional information in the sharps injury log;
(2) Providing Hawaii's employers with a three-year exemption for pre-filled syringes that are approved by the Federal Food and Drug Administration; and
(3) Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for purposes of clarity and style.
As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Labor and Public Employment that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 790, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 790, H.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Finance.
Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Health and Labor and Public Employment,
|
____________________________ TERRY NUI YOSHINAGA, Chair |
____________________________ DENNIS A. ARAKAKI, Chair |