Injury claim news - 02/11/2006

Campaign hopes to reduce work-related accidents in young people

The annual European Week for Safety and Health at Work, a campaign intended to raise awareness about health and safety issues and reduce the number of work-related accidents, focuses on young people this year.

Young people get hurt more often in work-related accidents
Too many young people being involved in accidents at work is the reason behind this year's campaign. 18-24-year-olds are at least 50 % more likely than any other age group to suffer personal injuries in a work-related accident or develop occupational health problems.

A young worker aged 18-24 is injured every 12 minutes, seriously injured every 40 minutes and killed every four weeks in the EU. Most of the time they are not being careless or "accident prone", they just do not have enough work experience.

Poor management, failure to implement standards and lack of employee awareness about health and safety standards are some of the reasons for the high rate of work-related accidents involving young people.

Amongst the activities forming the 2006 Week for Safety and Health at Work are national events, training initiatives and seminars, risk assessments and a wide range of learning activities including company visits.

Safe Start gets strong support across the EU
Safe Start has already received support from employers' representatives, trade unions, youth groups and educational organisations in all the EU Member States, according to the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work.

Director of the aforementioned European Agency Jukka Takala comments: "Employers need to do more to protect young workers and young people need to be more aware of health and safety issues when they enter the world of work..we can't just leave it until young people have already started work to teach them about health and safety. We have to reach them early - while they are still at school or college - so that they get used to a culture of risk prevention."

The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (based in Spain) was set up by the European Union to provide information on occupational health and safety. Read more at www.osha.europa.eu.

Although EU health and safety standards have been in place for some time to help avoid work-related accidents, the rate of accidents is still extremely high and employers are failing to pay close enough attention to workplace health and safety practices. Unfortunately, it is young people who often suffer as a result.