Lakeland’s global pattern disposable coveralls set a new world-wide benchmark in protective clothing. Designed to be used throughout the world and to meet all regional standards, they achieve a high specification – including certification to the demanding European “CE” standards.
While in Europe there is a legal obligation to sell, buy, and use CE-certified PPE, it is optional to use certified PPE in the USA. It also comes with a higher price tag. So, why should users choose to spend more on a CE-certified product like Lakeland’s MicroMax® NS Global?
In fact, that is the wrong question.
The right question is:
“Why would you take the risk of using non-certified PPE?”
Lakeland’s ground-breaking new disposable coveralls are a huge step forward in protection for our multinational customers. Designed to guard against light spray and splashes of liquids, as well as hazardous dust particulates, MicroMax® NS Global is the first line of protective clothing developed to meet all standards in all regions.
Users in the USA, Europe, Asia, or anywhere else now have access to the same global product – an important option for multinational manufacturers looking to standardize protection across their manufacturing facilities.
In regions where the use of certified PPE is not mandatory, or even necessarily advised, it’s important to address why this PPE is important.
What is the Purpose of PPE and PPE Standards?
This comes down to two essential questions:
What is PPE for?
Many workplace hazards – chemicals, flash fire, falls from height, and so on – are critical. Serious injury and even death are possible consequences of a failure to protect against them.
The consequences of a failure to protect is not only hazardous for the health of workers, but it may also be critical for the business. The results of a serious injury or death in the workplace include lost production time, opportunity costs, time-consuming enquiries, substantial fines, and more – perhaps even legal action against the directors and owners. Effective protection of employees also protects the financial health of the company.
What are PPE standards for?
The purpose of certification to any standard, is to provide independent proof that PPE will work. In other words, that it meets minimum performance criteria and will protect workers.
Given these two points, if you choose to use PPE that is not certified, a third question is this:
“How do you know it will protect at all?”
So, the real benefit derived from the additional cost of certified PPE is greater confidence that it will work. Confidence that it will do the job of protection that it should and will protect workers from those hazards that can otherwise seriously injure or kill.
Why Should I Buy CE-Certified Disposable Protective Clothing?
- Many of the chemicals which these types of coveralls protect against (asbestos, silica dust, solvents in paints or GRP processing, chemicals in cleaning fluid, etc.) constitute serious hazards, with life-changing or even life-ending consequences.
- The purpose of standards is to ensure that PPE products at least achieve a minimum performance level and will do the job of protection it should. They contain various types of testing to ensure this.
- There are no standards in the USA for disposable or chemical protective clothing. The EU has established detailed CE standards for these products that include extensive, independent testing to confirm minimum performance.
- In the USA, given the absence of home-grown standards, buying CE certified coveralls is the only way you can have any confidence that it will protect workers. If you buy non-CE-certified disposable protective clothing, you literally have no idea if it will protect or not. You are providing workers with PPE that you hope will protect them.
With Lakeland ‘s MicroMax® NS Global CE-certified coveralls in your PPE portfolio, you are not relying on a hope. You can rest assured with the knowledge and confidence that workers have PPE that will protect them.
In fact, the important question is not “why buy CE certified disposable protective coveralls?” That is obvious. The real question is this:
“Why would you take the risk of buying anything else?”
