The integration of the social determinants of health paradigm by occupational and public health researchers and institutions is leading to a recognition of the need for a more holistic and nuanced perspective on work and its impact on population health (Ahonen et al 2018; Schulte and Vainio, 2010; WHO 2008). Fundamental to this transformation is the need to complement traditional approaches to occupational health with new conceptual and methodological perspectives that can better account for the social aspects of health and well-being.

Occupational health evolved into a fundamentally technical and applied field dedicated to identifying and eliminating the physical, chemical, and biologic hazards found at the workplace (Peckham et al, 2017). This has resulted in a view of cause and effect rooted in the biomedical model of health (Farmer et al, 2006). As a result, the injury experience is removed from its geographical, historical, and social context. While this approach has led to significant reductions in occupational injury and illness, it has separated occupational health from its historical roots in social medicine and limited its ability to account for the social structures that circumscribe health outcomes (Flynn, 2018).   It has also led to the distinction between work-related and non-work-related exposures, injuries, and illnesses which has evolved into a line of demarcation between occupational safety and health and other disciplines within public health (Peckham et al, 2017; Flynn and Wickramage 2017). This division has limited the ability of occupational and public health institutions to address the significant influence that work has over aspects of life that contribute or detract from workers’ health and that of their families.