Boston, Mass., November 5, 2006
-- Adam M. Finkel, ScD, MPP, CIH, received the 2006 David P. Rall Award for Advocacy in Public Health today from the American Public Health Association (APHA) for his career in advancing science in the service of public health protection.
The Rall award annually recognizes an individual who has made outstanding contributions to public health through science–based advocacy.
As one of the nation’s leading experts in quantitative risk assessment for environmental and occupational health, Finkel’s career has combined both regulatory and enforcement divisions of the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and public advocacy for environmental and worker protection in the face of personal and professional obstacles.
While a fellow at Resources for the Future from 1987 to 1994, Finkel developed the first epidemiologic estimate of the extent of variation in human susceptibility to carcinogenic substances. He wrote major portions of the National Academy of Sciences committee report “Science and Judgment in Risk Assessment,” co-authored the book “Worst Things First?,” recommending alternatives to risk-based ranking and testified 11 times before congressional committees on risk assessment reforms, federal research priorities, air toxic hazards, pesticide policy and other topics.
While director of health standards at OSHA from 1995–1999, Finkel led the development of the final health standards that OSHA promulgated between 1992 and 2006 and developed several major regulatory proposals, including those for tuberculosis and assigned protection factors. Among his work while an OSHA regional director from 2000–2003, Finkel established regional enforcement emphases in needlestick prevention and chemical overexposure and analyzed fatal industry accidents in the region and spoke out about the need for targeted prevention campaigns.
Finkel currently serves as professor of environmental and occupational health at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey’s School of Public Health and visiting professor of public affairs at Princeton University. He continues research on the inadequacy of current risk assessment methods to protect workers and has filed suit against OSHA seeking air sampling data from U.S. workplaces under the Freedom of Information Act.