Media Inquires

The International Surface Fabricators Association (ISFA) represents fabrication shops across North America committed to producing quality stone surfaces safely and responsibly. As global attention turns to cases of silicosis among stone fabricators, we want to be clear about where we stand and how we are working to protect the people at the heart of this industry: the workers on the shop floor.

Dust is dangerous, and we treat it that way. Respirable crystalline silica, generated when any stone product is cut, ground, or polished, can cause serious and irreversible lung disease. This is true across the full range of materials our industry works with, and the hazards associated with higher-silica engineered stone in particular are well documented. We do not minimize these risks. We take them as the starting point for everything we do.

Stone can be fabricated safely when the right controls are in place. Decades of occupational health research, and the experience of well-run shops across the country, show that the controls needed to protect workers are well established: wet cutting and water suppression, properly fitted respiratory protection, engineered ventilation, regular exposure monitoring, and ongoing health surveillance. No industrial hygienist has concluded that fabrication cannot be done safely. The question is whether shops are doing it safely, every day, for every worker.

The cases of silicosis being reported around the world are, overwhelmingly, failures of workplace controls. Published case series consistently describe workers in shops that were dry cutting without water suppression, without adequate respiratory protection, with poorly maintained ventilation, and with no exposure monitoring or health surveillance in place. These are not unavoidable outcomes of the work. They are the outcomes of the work being done without the protections every fabricator deserves.

ISFA's position is that licensing should be required for every manufacturing and fabrication facility in the country, regardless of the product being fabricated. Voluntary standards and inconsistent enforcement have not been enough to protect workers, and the gap between shops doing this work properly and those that aren't is too wide to close without structural reform.

A credible licensing framework must include:

• Mandatory registration of every fabrication facility, so regulators, workers, and the public know who is operating and under what standards.
• Regular auditing of facilities against established health and safety requirements, including dust controls, PPE, ventilation, exposure monitoring, and worker health surveillance.
• Significant fines for non-compliance, scaled to ensure they function as a real deterrent rather than a cost of doing business.
• Loss of license for facilities that repeatedly or egregiously fail to protect their workers.
• Relicensing requirements that demonstrate corrective action and sustained compliance before a facility can return to operation.

This is the framework we are advancing, and our strategy is to move it forward nationally, across every product category. Efforts to discredit this work, or to distract from it through litigation-driven narratives and competing commercial agendas, will not change our direction. The workers depending on this industry cannot afford for us to be pulled off course.

Our work is built around three commitments:

• Supporting the businesses that are already meeting their responsibilities to their workers.
• Helping those that aren't, by providing training, education, and clear guidance on the controls and practices required to fabricate safely.
• Drawing a firm line with shops that refuse to meet those responsibilities. There is no place in our community for businesses that will not protect their workers.

This is a complex issue, and no single organization can solve it alone. Worker protection requires industry, regulators, clinicians, occupational health specialists, worker advocates, and the press all pulling in the same direction. ISFA is open to constructive dialogue with anyone who shares the goal of preventing harm.

We are particularly concerned that the workers at the center of this issue can get lost in disputes between product categories, litigation, competing commercial interests, including paid medical expert witnesses. Our focus stays on the shop floor, on the controls that work, and on the people whose health depends on them.

ISFA welcomes inquiries from journalists, researchers, regulators, and members of the public seeking to understand the steps the fabrication industry is taking to protect workers. We ask that requests include the focus of the story or inquiry and any specific claims or sources being referenced, so we can engage substantively and provide accurate information.

For media inquiries, please contact: Lorenzo Marquez, ISFA Chief of Brand, at lorenzo@isfanow.org