Safe Workplace and Safety News

An article in Athletic Business summarizes the status of fines related to the death of a Buffalo News sports reporter who fell from steep stairs going up to a press box in a high school stadium.

I originally wrote about this on April 8th in a post titled: "An OSHA Recommendation Run Amok".

Initially state safety regulators fined the school district. Then OSHA stepped in and said that the newspaper should be fined $31,500. And the discussion about what is right continues to swirl on the web.

You can read the Athletic Business article here.

Labels: OSHA Fines, safety and the media

The Washington State Department of Labor and Industries (L&I), in partnership with four business and labor organizations, began an advertising campaign on Monday to raise awareness about the importance of workplace safety in Washington state.

Television, radio and Internet ads in Western Washington will spread the message that the most important reason for making your workplace safe is not at work at all. Instead, workplace safety is important as a means of sustaining relationships with family and friends outside the workplace.

The centerpiece ad, called Homecomings, shows people coming home from work to their loved ones, juxtaposed against one boy who is worried that his dad isn't home from work yet. The ad concludes with a reminder that, on average, two people die every week in Washington from on-the-job injuries and illnesses. The ads call attention to WorkSafe.Lni.wa.gov web site and resources for making workplaces safer.

L&I purchased licensing rights to an award-winning workplace-safety campaign developed in Australia, saving creative and development costs. The ads were repurposed for Washington residents, including voice-overs to eliminate the Australian accent.

In Australia, surveys showed that about 85 percent of viewers thought the ads were quite or very effective. Also, 24 percent of employers and 18 percent of employees said they had personally taken action as a result of the campaign. This was considered a very strong result in a low-interest category such as occupational safety and health.

About $450,000 in TV and radio airtime and Internet space has been purchased. The money comes from dedicated workers' compensation funds, which can't be used for purposes other than workers' comp and workplace safety.

Labels: safety, safety and the media

I bring up the following article just because it seems to be generating a lot of discussion and press coverage. This one is from the Kansas City Star editorial page.

The question involves a newspaper sports reporter who was injured (and later died from those injuries) while climbing "stairs" to the press box on the roof of a high school stadium.

Who is responsible? His employer, the Buffalo News? The high school? Or is this just a normal hazard that sports reporters must deal with?

Labels: fall protection, safety and the media

With all the "news" about OSHA not doing their job properly, and the need for OSHA reform, I've wondered why no one has taken a look at the actual numbers. What have the real-life results been? There will always be problem areas that need attention, but overall has the approach to safety that has been taken by OSHA resulted in an increase or decrease in the number injuries?

The following is summarized from the Bureau of Labor Statistics web site. 2006 is the most recent year for which data is available.

WORKPLACE INJURIES AND ILLNESSES IN 2006

The total recordable case (TRC) injury and illness incidence rate among private industry employers in 2006 was the lowest since the SOII was first conducted.

Nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses among private industry employers in 2006 occurred at a rate of 4.4 cases per 100 equivalent full-time workers—a decline from 4.6 cases in 2005. Similarly, the number of nonfatal occupational injuries and illnesses reported in 2006 declined to 4.1 million cases, compared to 4.2 million cases in 2005.

Key findings of the 2006 Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses (SOII)

• Incidence rates and numbers of cases for injuries and illnesses combined declinedsignificantly in 2006 for most case types, with the exception of cases involving job transfer or restriction only.



• The number and incidence rate of injuries both declined significantly in 2006 compared to 2005. The number declined by 3% and the incident rate declined by 5%.



• The number and incidence rate of illnesses declined significantly in 2006 compared to 2005—mainly the result of declines among hearing loss and all other illness categories.



• The size of the data set was increased. Estimates were tabulated for more than 70 additional industries in 2006.



• TRC rates declined among 9 of the 19 private industry NAICS sectors in 2006 and
  remained statistically unchanged in the remaining 10 NAICS sectors.



• TRC rates in 10 of 43 states (including the District of Columbia) for which SOII
  estimates are available were lower in 2006 compared to a year earlier; TRC rates in 32 states remained relatively unchanged; and the TRC rate in 1 state was higher in 2006.

Altought there was a 2% increase in the number of hours worked, the injury and illness rate declined for nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses among private industry employers in 2006. Similarly, for goods-producing industries as a whole and for service-providing industries as a whole the number of hours worked rose two percent while the number of cases declined three percent. This resulted in rate declines for total recordable injuries and illnesses in both of these industries in 2006

Mining experienced the lowest incidence rate in 2006 among goods-producing industry
sectors—3.5 cases per 100 full-time workers.

Fourteen industries, each having at least 100,000 injuries and illnesses combined,
accounted for more than 1.8 million cases (45 percent) of the 4.1 million total. General medical and surgical hospitals (NAICS 6221) reported more injuries and illnesses than any other industry in 2006—more than 264,300 cases.

Selected Industry Sectors at a Glance

Construction. Similar to private industry, incidence rates for all case types, with the exception of cases with job transfer or restriction, were lower in construction in 2006 than in 2005. These declines resulted from a six percent increase in hours worked while the number of cases of all types remained statistically unchanged.

Manufacturing. The rate of total recordable injury and illness cases in manufacturing declined significantly in 2006—from 6.3 to 6.0 cases per 100 full-time workers.

Transportation and warehousing. The number of injury and illness cases and the rate at which they occurred decreased significantly in this industry sector in 2006, with the TRC rate falling from 7.0 to 6.5 cases per 100 full-time workers.

Utilities. A 12 percent decrease in the number of injury and illness cases reported among establishments in this sector resulted in a decline in the TRC rate from 4.6 to 4.1 cases per 100 full-time workers in 2006.

Health care and social assistance. The number of industries for which estimates were
tabulated in this sector was greatly expanded in 2006. The number of injuries and illnesses and the rate at which they occurred in 2006 remained relatively unchanged in this sector.

Labels: safety, safety and the media

This week's series of articles in the Charlotte Observer is stirring up up a significant reaction on the internet. The articles report on safety and health in the House of Raeford Farms' chicken processing plant. My last post, on Monday, reported on the the first article in this series.

Today's article talks about workers being injured and quickly returned to work so as to avoid recording lost time incidents. The article opens with the a story about Cornelia Vicente:

"Cornelia Vicente was packing chicken tenders at House of Raeford Farms' plant in 2003 when a conveyor belt snagged her hand, snapped her right arm and ripped off the tip of her index finger.

Maintenance workers struggled to free her, and paramedics rushed her to a hospital.

Hours after surgery, Vicente recalled, a House of Raeford nurse who had come to the hospital gave her some news: She was expected back at the plant early the next day."

You can read today's article at: http://www.charlotte.com/109/story/492672.html

House of Raeford Farms' is certainly getting a lot of bad publicity. How do you avoid bad publicity? Do safety right in the first place. Yes, the media does sometimes report information incorrectly. I've had many media stories done about me and I can't say I remember one of them that got the story 100% right. Knowing how to manage the media is important from a marketing viewpoint, if you want reporting about you to be as accurate as possible. But, if you are not doing safety right in the first place, you deserve to have problems brought into the light.

I'm not willing to make a judgment about House of Raeford Farms' based solely on one newspaper's coverage. If these articles are accurately revealing the situation, House of Raeford needs to stop doing media damage control and get their safety problems straightened out. If the articles are not accurate, they should make employees available to the press who will help reveal the truth.

Labels: safety and the media, workplace safety