World Day for Safety and Health at Work: Anticipate, prepare and respond to crises

According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), every year 317 million accidents occur on the job, and more than 2.3 million people die worldwide because of occupational accidents or work-related diseases. Although the international community has adopted more than 40 Standards dealing with occupational safety and health and over 40 Codes of Practice, in large parts of the world safe working environments are not still the rule.

At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic has had dramatic impact on almost every aspect of the world of work: viral exposure means that the mere presence at the workplace poses risks for the worker’s health, especially in workplaces without health protocols; or, in other cases, the measures to prevent transmission at the workplace have adverse effects on the safety of the workforce and increase the safety risks instead of mitigating them (e.g., overload/ excessively long shifts for some workers because others must work from home, or dangerous work without supervision, because of restrictions in the number of people that are allowed to be present at the same place). Moreover, shifts to flexible forms of working arrangements, such as teleworking which has seen a rapid rise, pose new dangers for the working population, including mental health issues.

For these reasons, today’s World Day for Safety and Health at Work is focused on the strengthening of national workplace safety systems and strategies that build resilience, in order to prepare for future crises.

On this occasion, CESI Secretary General Klaus Heeger stresses the importance of effective occupational safety and health policies and recalls that CESI has been for long a strong proponent of resilient protection schemes for workers: “We have been advocating workplace safety long before the COVID crisis. But it is never too late. Even now, we must learn from the lessons and the mistakes we did during the pandemic and work together towards the creation of safe and healthy working environments that withstand future crises. Next to physical health, this concerns especially mental health: The lockdowns and the decoupling of the work patters have led to psychological strains among many workers and this mental dimension of work-related risks is here to stay.”