Ontario. Division of Industrial Hygiene

• Division of Industrial Hygiene

• Ontario. Industrial Hygiene Branch

The Industrial Hygiene Division was created in 1920 within the Ontario Provincial Board of Health. In its first year it concentrated mainly on the collection of information; the following year it moved into more investigation and issuing of recommendations. The Division continued to exist after the Department of Health was established in 1924 and often cooperated with the Department of Labour. From 1936-1938 and then 1959 until its dissolution, the Division was known as the Industrial Hygiene Branch.

In 1962 the Division (at this time referred to as a Branch) was reorganized into several separate units which by 1964 had settled into the following eight sections: Branch Administration, General Industrial Hygiene, Industrial Hygiene Laboratory, Radiation Protection Laboratory and Field Services, Occupational Chest Diseases, Air Pollution Control, Stuffed Articles and Pesticides Control, and the Civil Service Employee Health Service.

In April 1963, the Provincial Sanitary Inspectors were transferred from the jurisdiction of the Industrial Hygiene Branch to the Public Health Administration Branch to become an integral part of the Northern Ontario Public Health Services (NOPHS).

When the Department of Health underwent a major reorganization in 1966, the Industrial Hygiene Branch was amalgamated with the Environmental Sanitation Branch to form the new Environmental Health Services Branch.

The Industrial Hygiene Division was responsible for the assessment of health hazards associated with industrial physical and chemical agents, atmospheric pollution, pesticides, and herbicides. It provided consultative and laboratory services to other Ontario government departments, agencies and industries. The Division enforced and administered the Silicosis Act (1950), the Air Pollution Control Act, the Pesticides Act, and the Stuffed Articles Regulations (under the Public Health Act). It also supervised the Civil Service Employee Health Service.

In 1935 the Division was given responsibility for the Department's interest in cancer control and its activities included purchasing (and later manufacturing) radon seeds for cancer treatment and maintaining statistics on cancer rates.

RAD: Rules for Archival Description, 2nd edn (2008)

2026-11-16: migrated to AtoM

Annual reports of the Department of Health, 1920-1966

Inventory RG 10

Canadiana

Archivist(s):
Marg McIntyre, Judith Pudden