Missions

The FACING SILICA project (FAvoring systemiC prevention by revisiting environmental SILica hazards In the Current erA)
Scientific background
Crystalline silica (or silicon dioxide, SiO2) is the most widespread mineral component of the earth's crust and as such is involved in many airborne exposures of workers in manufacturing activities using mineral materials in one way or another.
The inhalation of crystalline silica is responsible for respiratory diseases such as silicosis (entailing pulmonary fibrosis) and lung cancer. An international conference held in Johannesburg in 1930 defined silicosis as a specific nosological entity. This definition formed the narrow framework within which medicine and epidemiology continued throughout the 20th century to describe and explore silica hazards. Silicosis was defined as a serious chronic respiratory disease, affecting underground miners following relatively moderate and long-lasting exposure to crystalline silica during their working life, with a long latency period supposed to precede the onset of the disease at advanced ages. This definitional framework of silicosis does not only cover medical knowledge: silicosis is a medicolegal entity, i.e. a disease whose medically accepted forms correspond to social benefits, within national social protection schemes covering workers' health. This medicolegal character has made silicosis a historical case-model which has helped to highlight the mechanisms by which the occupational origin of health is invisible and under-recognised. The knowledge on silicosis and silica hazards has always remained relatively fragmentary in the 20th century, preventing medical knowledge from firmly establishing it, and also making it impossible to take these hazards and conditions into account in occupational health and safety prevention policies, or in compensation for sick workers.
For more than twenty years, studies in the social sciences (history, sociology) and biomedical sciences (including epidemiology and toxicology) have begun to question this state of knowledge, by highlighting that the chronic silicosis of miners alone does not make it possible to take into account the very prevalent health hazards of crystalline silica, which cause incurable diseases throughout the world. In new or expanding sectors of activity (e.g. denim sandblasting, artificial stone manufacturing and processing, ultra-fine sand handling in shale gas extraction, cutting of mineral borders in landscape gardening or public works), very serious and rapidly progressing silicosis occurs in very young workers (mainly men), causing their respiratory failure and death in the short term. These new facts confirm long-standing epidemiological clues on the possible immunological effects of exposure to crystalline silica particles.
The FACING SILICA project in this context, and the post-doc's place in the project
The FACING SILICA Franco-Spanish team is made up of specialists from the social and biomedical sciences, who are working together over the long term to (re)discover these risks, not only to better understand the extent of the pathogenesis of crystalline silica diseases, but also to study the status of patients suffering from these diseases, and more generally to understand the paradoxical and structural invisibility of work in explaining social inequalities in health.
When (rarely) diseases (apart from miners' silicosis) are recognized as possibly caused by crystalline silica, they almost never give rise to prevention or compensation, even when social protection would allow it. Certain other diseases (and sometimes the same ones!) continue to be considered by the medical profession as being of “unknown cause”, which makes it even more difficult for patients to assert the possible occupational origin of their ailments. In most cases, these illnesses are treated with severe side-effects, with no hope of a cure.
FACING SILICA is committed to promoting a historical understanding of the risks of crystalline silica, with the aim of translating its scientific findings into public health terms: remedying shortcomings in social protection and occupational risk prevention, gaining a better understanding of the pathogenic mechanisms underlying auto-immunity associated with crystalline silica, improving the living conditions of those affected and their families, and identifying pathogenic pathways that could constitute therapeutic targets.
The proposed post-doctoral position focuses on quantifying the occupational and environmental determinants of systemic sclerosis. The main aim will be to gather quantitative data to measure changes in the recognition of systemic sclerosis as an occupational disease in France. Insofar as it is possible to broaden the spectrum of diseases studied in the time available, other systemic autoimmune diseases may be covered by the same approach. In this case, the study of rheumatoid arthritis would take priority.
The post-doctoral fellow will work at Cermes3 (Villejuif, 94800) under the supervision of Catherine Cavalin (sociologist, CNRS) and in collaboration with the multidisciplinary Franco-Spanish FACING SILICA team, co-supervised by Alain Lescoat, a physician specializing in internal medicine at Rennes University Hospital and researcher at IRSET (Rennes).

Activités

- Contribute to literature reviews, in both the social and biomedical sciences, on the subjects covered by the project: occupational diseases, social protection, occupational and environmental exposures, mobilization of victims, diseases of unknown cause.
- Build up a database on the evolution of cases of systemic sclerosis recognized as being of occupational origin in France. The period to be covered will be as long as possible, essentially based on Health Insurance files (recognition under Table 25 of the general scheme; recognition under Table 22 of the agricultural scheme). The same applies to rheumatoid arthritis wherever possible, and possibly to other autoimmune systemic diseases.
- Propose analyses of these imperfect data, which require the interpretation of “small numbers” in health.
- To shed light on the analyses, interact with the post-doctoral researcher involved in interviews with patients suffering from systemic sclerosis. These interviews will provide a wealth of information on the obstacles to recognition of systemic sclerosis as an occupational disease, even for patients with irrefutable proof of occupational exposure to crystalline silica.
- Participate in publications resulting from project tasks. Articles, chapters and reports co-authored with FACING SILICA's biomedical and social science teams. Publications planned in French, Spanish and English.
- Present project results at conferences, study days, seminars, etc.
- Help organize meetings between team members.

Compétences

General profile
The researcher will hold a PhD in the social sciences, preferably in sociology or history. The candidate will have solid skills and a keen interest in the qualitative interpretation of “imperfect” quantitative data in the field of health, occupational health or environmental health.
A number of skills or aptitudes are not essential prerequisites, but will help to ensure that the person recruited participates fully in the content of the project and, we hope, also reaps for him/herself the rewards of this participation.
- Thus, while knowledge of the arcana of social protection, and particularly of work-related social insurance, is not a prerequisite, the person recruited must show an interest in this field.
- FACING SILICA ranges from basic biomedical science (animal experiments on the diseases and exposures studied) to questions of social protection or environmental injustice. Even if the tasks entrusted to the person recruited primarily concern the collection and analysis of administrative data, reading publications in the biomedical sciences and grasping their implications for the social sciences is a very important aspect of the job.
- Similarly, showing an interest in the diversity of methods used in the project (quantitative and qualitative methods, in the social and biomedical sciences) and thinking in terms of this mix is a strong feature of the research.
List of expected skills
- PhD in a social science discipline, preferably in sociology or history.
- Mastery of simple quantitative tools for exploratory purposes: how to accumulate data, generally involving small numbers, put them into series, make them readable, etc.
- Experience in writing scientific articles and other academic content (chapters, books, etc.) in French. Experience of writing articles in English (and possibly Spanish) would be appreciated, but is not a prerequisite.
- Writing skills: for academic purposes but also for a wider audience (reports and notes for decision-makers and the general public; various formats).
- Fluency in French and English (and possibly Spanish). A strong understanding of English (spoken and especially written) is essential. At least a written understanding of Spanish would be a great asset, but is by no means compulsory. The ability to write English (and/or Spanish) at an academic level would be a plus, but is not a prerequisite.
- Ability to work in a team and with people from other academic disciplines.
- Autonomy and ability to build a personal scientific project within the themes covered by the project.

Contexte de travail

The person's host laboratory will be Cermes3 (Villejuif site, 94800) (https://www.cermes3.cnrs.fr/fr/). Cermes3, Centre de recherche médecine, sciences, santé, santé mentale, société, is a multidisciplinary laboratory dedicated to the social analysis of transformations in the worlds of science, medicine and health, and their relationship to society. The laboratory brings together sociologists, historians, anthropologists, political scientists, economists and psychologists. Cermes3 is a laboratory of the CNRS (UMR 8211), Inserm (U988), EHESS and Université Paris Cité.
FACING SILICA is specifically linked to Cermes3's new research axis (known as «Axis 3: Health in the age of global environmental crisis»), which is dedicated to environmental health issues.