In the bottling works eyes are frequently lost through the impact of
popping corks. The bursting of unprotected water gauges caused many
cases of blindness yearly among engineers and machinists. In the
grinding trades eyes are frequently lost by bits of flying emery
becoming imbedded in the eyeball, and the Industrial Accident Commission
recommends iron or glass guards for emery wheels. In factories, quarries
and mines more serious damage is done by larger bits of metal or stone.
Sometimes harm is done in an attempt to remove the foreign body from
the eye, as the hands of the one performing this service may not be
clean, or the instrument used may be the corner of a soiled
handkerchief, a toothpick or match, or even, as sometimes happens, the
tongue. More eyes are injured from infection than from the presence of
foreign bodies, which, if properly and carefully removed, might result
only in temporary inconvenience and the loss of a few days work. Workmen
should not trust to the shop or factory doctor, but should go to the
company doctor at once. Immediate and competent care should be secured
without delay, and this will save eyes, and also save employers and
insurance companies a great deal of money.
Lime-burn, solder-burn, and all the so-called dusty trades produce
chronic inflammation of the eyes, which often results in total
blindness. The National Council of Safety enumerates fifty-five
industrial poisons, thirty-six of which affect the eyes. Absorption of
drugs often causes blindness--tobacco, wood alcohol, lead, used in so
many industries; bisulphide of carbon, used in making rubber;
nitro-benzol, used in the manufacture of explosives, and some of the
anilin dyes. Hoods and exhausts should be used to prevent the escape of
dangerous fumes, vapors and gases. For men exposed to great heat,
antisweat pencils have been manufactured, and when these are rubbed over
the goggles, the glass will remain clear of steam for hours. Special eye
coverings are designed for men working over acids, or in sand blasting.
One of our pupils, a man past fifty, who had worked in a creamery for
over twenty years, and who usually wore goggles when making tests with
sulphuric acid, neglected to take the precautionary measure one morning,
and some of the acid splashed up into his eyes. He is totally blind, and
must begin life all over again. There have been so many cases of
blindness as a result of dynamite explosions occurring in quarries and
mines, that laws have been enacted for the protection of workmen. When a
blast has been fired, and it is not certain that all the charges have
exploded, no person is permitted to enter the place until forty-five
minutes after the explosion. My records prove the great need for this
precautionary measure, and I only wish it had been enforced years ago,
before so many men in the prime of life had been deprived of eyesight,
and of earning capacity as well.
Improper lighting and ventilating in factories, shops and stores, and
work requiring excessive eyestrain, contributes to a long list of
disabilities often resulting in total blindness. The passage, by our
last Legislature, of the Common Towel Bill, prohibiting the use of
roller towels anywhere in the state, has removed one of the most
flagrant causes of infection, and one to which very little attention was
paid by factory workers generally. I know one young man and two young
women whose total blindness is the result of infection from the use of a
roller towel.
I trust all these facts and figures may not prove wearisome, for it is
necessary to know them if you are to realize the extent of the work
being done here and elsewhere to prevent blindness and conserve vision.
I have not mentioned all the activities of the State Industrial Accident
Commission, or the National Council of Safety, but a visit to the Safety
Museum, 525 Market street, San Francisco, or to the Union League
Building, Los Angeles, will enlighten you further as to the progress of
the Safety First movement, and convince you of the wisdom and humanity
of it. Let us adopt prevention and conservation as household words; let
us do our share in spreading the gospel, and soon we shall have fewer
blind babies, fewer children sitting on the side lines, and fewer men
and women deprived of eyesight at the floodtide of life. This is another
of my dreams, and this one is already coming true. "Let there be light!"
was the first recorded utterance of the Most High God. "Let there be
light!" has been the watchword on the lips of human progress during all
the centuries that have gone, and they must be the battle-cry of
Progress during all the centuries that are to come. I am sure we shall
all be glad to do our share to preserve this light for our own and
future generations.
End of Project Gutenberg's Five Lectures on Blindness, by Kate M. Foley