Work, Home, Sleep... Hospital?

It seems that the workers in Asian assembly lines, particularly the ones in China, have even worse conditions than many suspected. A common day in the life of one of these assembly workers could consist of spending all day exposing plastics to fire, smelling the chemical-smoke that it emits, and sorting the plastic in any number of bins, then repeating the process for 14 hours of the day, every day. They could even be working for  any number of reputable companies, like Microsoft or Apple. Assembly line workers have been exposed to dangerous chemicals from the adhesive used in making Apple laptops, or be subjected to a chronic disease from the cleaning chemicals used in making a touch screen computer.

These are mothers, daughters, fathers, and sons who are being affected. Everyday, working-class people in China are put under extreme conditions and given little or no monetary compensation for the suffering their work environment causes. For example, a computer assembly line worker in China was exposed to a dangerous chemical for many years, and eventually his condition deteriorated to the point where he was in the hospital; his nervous system irreversibly damaged.

"I am back at work but my symptoms are still with me. My legs still hurt. This will accompany me for the rest of my life. It’s very painful", says the assembly worker.

It's things like this that gets little attention in international news, while it really should. These people have children, and a family to support. Simply using dangerous chemicals that kill-off workers for the sake of efficiency and low-cost simply isn't right.

Decide for yourself by reading the full article here.