Article Text

other Versions

Download PDFPDF
Subtle exposures, invisible outcomes, real suffering: sex, gender and occupational health
  1. Karen Messing
  1. Interdisciplinary Research Centre on Well-Being, Health, Society and Environment (CINBIOSE), Universite du Quebec a Montreal, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
  1. Correspondence to Dr Karen Messing, Interdisciplinary Research Centre on Well-Being, Health, Society and Environment (CINBIOSE), Universite du Quebec a Montreal, Montreal, Canada; messing.karen{at}uqam.ca

Statistics from Altmetric.com

Request Permissions

If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

In this issue of OEM, Johnson et al1 report on occupational risks to menstrual health. This is an original study of data collected during the 1990s comparing work demands and menstrual cycle irregularity of flight attendants and teachers from three cities in the USA. Although flight attendants’ characteristics and working conditions have changed considerably over the past 30 years, for example, because smoking is now prohibited on aeroplanes, this article is exceptional and instructive as part of a tiny body of work on occupational risks to menstrual health such as cold exposure,2 schedule irregularities, physical workload,3 some chemicals4 5 and perhaps radiation.

Historically, women’s occupational health experiences have been understudied, and studies on workplace effects on female sex-related outcomes are rarer still.6 7 There are several determinants of this neglect. One important reason we still tend to underplay female-specific risks is that women must reconcile their access to equality at work with their need to protect their health, in a context where pointing out any difference from men’s biology can be used to support discrimination against women. Until the 1970s, most women were excluded from paid employment, and especially from jobs that looked difficult or dangerous. Arguments about women’s ‘nature’ abounded, and limitations were placed on women’s (and children’s) work schedules and job options. Thus, in my province of Quebec, Canada, women were not fully included in occupational health and safety legislation until 1979.

Accordingly, most scientific studies of women’s occupational health before the 1980s concentrated on whether and when women should be excluded from working. A considerable literature emerged on chemical exposures dangerous to foetuses, and potentially pregnant women …

View Full Text

Footnotes

  • Twitter @MessingKaren1

  • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

  • Competing interests None declared.

  • Provenance and peer review Commissioned; internally peer reviewed.

  • Author note Additional references to the literature and to court decisions can be obtained from the author.

Linked Articles