Today's Safety News

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A recent Swiss survey of the working population shows that in 2013 over one million people suffered damage to their health due to their occupational activity. Eleven per cent of those questioned reported suffering from a health problem linked to their work (750 000 people) and 6 percent had been the victim of a workplace accident (316 000 people).

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has announced the launch of Prescription Drug Overdose: Prevention for States, a new program to help states end the ongoing prescription drug overdose epidemic.

On Aug. 27, 2015, representatives from the American Industrial Hygiene Association® (AIHA) attended the 4th Annual United States - China Workplace Safety and Health Dialogue meeting in Seattle, Wash.

A business executive once told me that safety is a “necessary evil.” When I asked him to elaborate, it became clear that his view of OSH had been distorted by expensive projects and equipment upgrades at his company, all driven by regulatory compliance concerns. He was skeptical as to whether these compliance improvements would actually improve his organization’s safety performance.

The Mine Safety and Health Administration today announced that federal inspectors issued 225 citations and six orders during special impact inspections at 15 coal mines and six metal and nonmetal mines in July.

On August 13, 2015, another worker was suffocated by palm fronds in California (see news report ). This is at least the fourth similar fatality since the California Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation (FACE) program (CA/FACE) program issued a report and video on this hazard in February 2014.

OSHA has awarded $10.5 million in one-year federal safety and health training grants to 80 nonprofit organizations across the nation for education and training programs to help high-risk workers and their employers recognize serious workplace hazards, implement injury prevention measures and understand their rights and responsibilities.

“One of the greatest challenges in occupational safety and health is ensuring that promising research findings become safer practices on the jobsite,” according to Pete Stafford, Executive Director of the Center for Construction Research and Training (CPWR).

Lessard Roofing and Siding Inc. and Lessard Brothers Construction Inc., both located in Greene, Maine, were cited by the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration for safety violations 11 times at 11 different work sites in Maine between 2000 and 2011.