According to a recent report by National Workplace Safety and Health Statistics Report, workplace fatalities in H1 2019, with 17 cases recorded versus 23 in H2 2018.
While the workplace fatalities have decreased since 2012, non-fatal injuries such as slips, trips, and falls (STF), and machine-related incidences remained a top cause of both major and minor injuries.
The key highlights include:
- An eight percent increase STF-related minor injuries from H1 2018 (1,630) to H1 2019 (1,757)
- As for machine-related incidences, these came in as the second most common cause of major and minor injuries. In particular, there was a rise in the number of such major injuries year-on-year (35 in H1 2018 vs 41 in H1 2019)
- At the same time, the number of minor injuries related to machinery spiked from 956 cases in H1 2018, to 1,066 in H2 2019
- Industries with little improvement in performance – construction, manufacturing, and transportation & storage
- As for the transportation & storage industry, the number of fatal and major injuries rose from 22 in H1 2018 to 35 in H1 2019.
According to the report, the performance of the construction and manufacturing industries “did not improve significantly, and were, in fact, the top two contributors of fatal and major injuries in H1 2019 (66 cases collectively).
The report also highlights that the number of workplace major injury cases increased by 10 percent from 286 cases in 1H 2018 to 316 cases in 1H 2019. Similarly, workplace minor injuries increased by eight percent from 5,769 cases in 1H 2018 to 6,228 cases in 1H 2019.