03/18/2026: From Science to Policy: Worker Safety and the Proposed USDA Line-Speed Rules

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From Science to Policy: Worker Safety and the Proposed USDA Line-Speed Rules

About the webinar:

This webinar will provide a historical overview of poultry and swine slaughterhouse evisceration line-speed regulations in the United States, along with the scientific evidence that has informed these policies over time. The session will summarize key findings from the Poultry and Pork Processing Line Speed (PULSE) studies, which examined the relationship between production speed, biomechanical exposures, and worker musculoskeletal disorder risk. It will also review the recently proposed USDA rule that would allow plants to operate without a maximum line-speed limit.The webinar will explore how scientific evidence should inform policies that balance productivity with worker safety.

Learning Objectives

At the completion of this activity, the learner will be able to:

Describe the history of U.S. poultry evisceration line-speed regulations and the science informing these policies.
Summarize key findings from the PULSE study on line speed, biomechanical exposure, and worker injury risk.
Explain the proposed USDA rule allowing poultry, turkey, and swine plants to operate without a maximum line-speed limit.
Discuss how scientific evidence should inform policies that balance productivity and worker safety.

Speaker: Carisa Harris, PhD, CPE

Carisa Harris-Adamson, PhD, CPE is a Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco. She is the Director of the Northern California COEH at the University of California, Berkeley, where she also directs the Human Factors and Ergonomics Laboratory. Her research focuses on the prevention of work-related musculoskeletal disorders through improved exposure assessment, biomechanical modeling, and the design of safer work systems. Dr. Harris-Adamson leads several large interdisciplinary projects examining repetitive and forceful work in high-intensity industries. She was a principal investigator of the Poultry Processing Line Speed (PULSE) study, a multi-site research effort examining the relationship between production speed, biomechanical exposures, and worker health in U.S. poultry plants.

Speaker: Robert Harrison, MD, MPH

Dr. Harrison is a Clinical Professor at the University of California, San Francisco. He has diagnosed and treated thousands of work and environmental injuries and illnesses, and designed and implemented numerous medical monitoring programs for workplace exposures. He has also consulted widely with employers, health care professionals, and labor organizations on the prevention of work-related injuries and illnesses. Dr. Harrison has led many work and environmental investigations of disease outbreaks. He has served as a technical and scientific consultant to the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration and to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. His research interests include the collection and analyses of California and national data on the incidence of work-related injuries and illnesses. Dr. Harrison has authored or co-authored more than 80 peer-reviewed journal articles, and more than 40 book chapters/contributed articles/letters to the editor. He is the co-editor of the most recent edition of the textbook in the field.

Speaker: Kelsey Eberly, JD

Kelsey Eberly is a Senior Staff Attorney at FarmSTAND, where she engages in strategic litigation and movement-centered advocacy to fight corporate control and expose abuses in the industrial animal agriculture system. Kelsey also teaches at Vermont Law and Graduate School on legal issues pertaining to animal agriculture. She was previously a lecturer and litigator with the Media Freedom & Information Access Clinic at Yale Law School, a policy fellow at the Brooks McCormick, Jr. Animal Law & Policy Program at Harvard Law School, and an attorney with the Animal Legal Defense Fund. Kelsey specializes in litigation to increase transparency and accountability in the industrial food system. She lives in Vermont with her family.

Certificates of Completion

Certificates of Completion will be available to webinar participants who are present for the complete, live webinar, and logged in with their registered email address. Call-in attendees are not eligible for certificates at this time - Please download the Zoom app to log in via email on your smartphone whenever possible.

In order to receive your Certificate of Completion, qualified learners must complete the post-webinar evaluation within 7 days of the webinar. A link to the evaluation will be emailed to qualified learners 24 hours after the webinar via no-reply@zoom.us. Qualified learners who submit their evaluation will receive a Certificate of Completion via email, and can also print/save the certificate from their browser after submitting their evaluation.

If you're not able to attend the live presentation, no problem! We record most presentations and will host them on our website provided we have permission to do so. Presentation recordings are not eligible for Certificates of Completion.

About the Center for Occupational and Environmental Health

The goal of the Northern California ERC, a consortium of programs at the University of California’s Center of Occupational and Environmental Health, is to train professionals as practitioner and research leaders in occupational safety and health by offering graduate degrees, residency training, clinical experiences, and research mentorship to trainees. The aim of the ERC is to provide a broad, multidisciplinary educational experience involving student and faculty collaborations in the classroom, laboratory, and field. Through academic training, research, and community service projects, our faculty and trainees address ongoing and emerging challenges facing US Workers. Activities are grounded in multi-campus, interactive teaching programs that translate knowledge into information that can be used to improve worker safety and health.

ACCREDITATION

The Center for Occupational and Environmental Health designates this activity for a maximum of 1.0 Contact Hour. Participants should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation.

ACCESSIBILITY:

If you require an accommodation for effective communication (ASL interpreting/CART captioning, alternative media formats, etc.) to fully participate in this event, please contact Will Bellamy at (510) 642-8365 or wbellamy@berkeley.edu(link sends e-mail) with as much advance notice as possible and at least 7-10 days in advance of the event.