Details - Public Health Image Library(PHIL)

ID#:

9433

Caption:

This 1958 historical photograph was provided by the Center for Disease Control's (CDC), National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), and depicted a Lompoc, California industrial plant worker bagging diatomaceous earth. Local exhaust ventilation, and the use of a filtering respirator worn by the plant worker, reduced his exposure to the lung-damaging dust. Inhaled dust or other airborne particulate materials containing silica that is deposited in the lungs, will cause the lung tissue to react by creating generalized nodular fibrotic changes, and is known as pneumoconiosis, which is also known as pneumosilicosis, or grinders’ disease. The image originally appeared in a U.S. Public Health Service Publication No. 601, in an article entitled,“Pneumoconiosis in Diatomite Mining and Processing”, 1958.