OCCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY

INTRODUCTION

The occupational health and safety regulations are made for the safety of the employee and to provide a safe work environment for them. The occupational Health and Safety Regulation or OHSR mainly contains some of the compulsory rules and requirements that are mandatory for the company or the employee should be meet. These requirements are arranged under the Workers Compensation Act. Workers are usually facing a lot of risk at their work environment.

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 The Government and the authority of the work place can work together for the strong application of policies and regulations. Labor inspection play very important role in the making of work place legislation. Studies and proper evaluation of the workers also performed by the health and safety inspectors. Senses and proper record should be maintained for assessing the mortality and morbidity rate of the workers in every year might be useful for the formation of new legislations. After the formation of the new legislation they should be properly evaluated and then imply on the workers. This will be useful for the conduction of comparative study in the future.

Advancement in the technologies also have an unavoidable part in the increased morbidity rate in the workers at the work environment. Many changes came in the work places even in the hospitals. These should be properly ensured with the close valuation by the health safety workers and should be sure not to cause any hazard to the workers and the clients respectively. Some employees got morbid due to the exposure with biohazardous materials such as chemicals and other materials in their work site. Other causes can be because of improper maintenance of good body mechanics.

Arrangement of work schedules also can cause work place morbidity. All these factors are to be closely evaluated for the workers safety. This is not only for the protection of the employees but also as a part of respecting the right of the employee to work in a safe place. They have the right to refuse the work when he or she feels like they are provided with an unsafe working environment. They can also reject the area of work that ignored by another worker who also felt with same unprotected work area. While doing the new laws and regulations the workers feel also need to be assessed properly for making convenient regulations. This can be very helpful for the fulfillment of workers pleasure. While an incident occur in the work place, there should be done with a critical valuation of the incident.

The incident can be related with the similar events and can be attain a good legislation. The following lines discuss about the relation of the occupational safety legislation and the morbidity rate among the workers. The proper implementation of new safety regulations can be helpful for the safeguarding of employee safety. This will helpful for the reduction of morbidity rate among that occurs at the workplace.

Occupational safety and legislation is very important in the recent years. Risk assessment and periodic evaluation of the work environment site is very essential for ther the protection of the employees and thereby we can reduce the occupational morbidity rate to an extent. National legislations and other associated institutions which are working as international and national level take place an inevitable role in enforcement of occupational safety legislations. They are also responsible for the prevention of morbidity or the reduction in the number of employees who got injured at the work place because of any reasons.

Working conditions and other status of the work environment are monitored by the health inspector or the other qualified persons. The direct or indirect injuries associated with the work place are compensated by the company after the proper investigation of the accident. (Stojšić, 2014)

While moving on to the occupational safety and health act compliance, there are many standard regulations created by the government for the reduction of mortality and morbidity rate of the employees. Some instances that caused in the work site and legislations associated with the work place accident prevention are discussed in this article. The prevention of fall protection in the steel erection workers is discussed.

A study conducted in the year 2000 shows that 100% protection should be provided for all workers who work above 6 feet height from the ground. Those who are working in the connectors should be provided with all personnel fall arrest equipments or devices, the devices that used for safe positioning and fall resistance system should be ensured for the prevention of workplace morbidity.

Vince Gallagher, the president of safety research inc who worked for 12 years under the OSHA as an officer who awarded with good and safe ensuring of labourers from America. The proper organization and communication of work place incidents rewarded in with the compliment. The statistical study during the year 2003 to 2005 showed that the morbidity rate of workers due to fall was 38.7 in the iron field workers whereas the lowest morbidity rate reported among the plumbers. Overall the total rate of morbidity among the iron workers, roofer, carpenter, painter, foreman, drywall, electrician, heat A/C mechanic, laborer, brick mason and construction manager was 3.8%. (Silver Spring, 2008)

According to the announcement given by occupational safety and health act 2001, three major reasons are cited for the morbidity rate of the employers. First and foremost improper documentation of data regarding the number of employees injured. The documentation about the occupational injury and health hazards should be properly recorded and reported.

The second important reason noticed by the occupational safety and health act is the failure in the provision of fall arrest system. That means full body protection with lifeline attached. The fall arrest system could be properly arranged in the workplace for the employers according to the amendment given by the OSHA. The ladders play a crucial role in the fall of employees at the work environment. The employers are recommended to use iron ladders with strong wrenches and crowbars with the work platform and the rung that of 1 meter in diameter. Portable ladders is risky while compared to other ladders because of narrow rungs.

OSHA compliance 100% fall protection among the workers. They considered safety of the workers begin from the top that means 100% protection of workers from the fall. Second basic important factor in the reduction of morbidity among the employees is the safety monitoring specially on the low-sloped roofs. OSHA recommends to create a warning line system and the safety monitoring system to be replaced. Rops, wires, and chains constitute the warning line.

 The warning line usually located 6 feet distance apart from the location. There should be an individual required for the monitoring purpose. He should be responsible for the up to date valuation of the employee who are working at the low-sloped roofs. This will eventually help to diagnose the risk as soon as possible and thereby can take immediate action for the reduction in the work place morbidity. Other legislations are made by the OSHA in the field of moving vehicles. When the worker is injured while he is on duty, the occupational safety health officers will assess the situation and provide funding for him. The regulation given by OSHA explains about the ladder usage on the flat surfaces and the workers are not permitted to use the ladders in unsafe or slippery surface that can cause injury to the user. (Gallagher, 2015)

International organization or standardization shared some standards regarding the safety management system in the work place. they recommended some alignment for assigning safety in different parts of the company and the alignments are the following:

Vertical alignment

Horizontal alignment

External alignment

Vertical alignment deals with the communication between CEO and other crew members. This helps CEO to carry out the role of a leader and he can directly protect the workers from causing occupational health hazards and morbidity rate of the workers.

Horizontal alignment deals with the intra departmental workers and executives. Duties of them are categorized and are inter related.

External alignment deals with the program planned by the company, owners, share holders, regulators and public.

The roles of safety professionals are very important for the provision of workers safety. International organization for standardization amended a new legislation in march 2018 for the development of the professionals as an active member of workers safety. All the professionals are to be molded as good leaders as well as good managers. They provided with good knowledge, orientation about safety process and exposure in the work environment. For the attainment of good quality leadership following factors should be considered:

Budgeting

Prioritization

Influence

Communication

Mediating

External representative

Budgeting is done for the safety of the business with good justification of the budget.

Prioritization is mainly carried out for the exploration of most common and most dangerous workplace hazard. This helps to reduce the occurrence of morbidity due to work place accidents.

Communication is the good method to notice work place risk and to ensure safety prior to the occurrence of accident.

External representative stand for safety heads for their companies, regulators and for the customers with commitment to reduce work place morbidity.

The quality safety program by ISO (International Organization for Standardization) is to ensure an ultimately safe work environment in the industrial field and other carriers with employees who are at the risk of causing workplace morbidity. (Wells, 2018)

Occupational safety and health act contributed some hazard communication standards as a part of federal regulation in the industrial field for the overall protection of the workers. They contributed the hazard communication system as a part of review about the worker training system in the 20th century. They arranged various training programs for all the workers to compete with work place challenges. Some of the employees are working with exposure to chemicals that can seriously cause damage to their health.

 The workers may or may not be knowing the hazardous effect of the chemicals may be because of poor training or improper communication method. This legislation is made in accordance with the right to know, requirement for the workers. Each and every employer have the right to know all about the workplace where they are getting employed. They also have the right to refuse the work.

If any one of the employee is feels like unsafe work environment or risk to their lives that can ignore the duty by reporting the higher authority. This is also a part of important communication method. This reflects optimum level of hazard communication between the employ and employers.

The study conducted by department of education found with many employees who are illiterate. It comes about 20 million among the total worker in US. The training program for the employee is considered as the most effective way to enrich the individuals with good and adequate knowledge. This will help them to learn how to manage the workplace hazards and other risk factor assessment at the work site. This not only helps the worker to protect their life but also to handle the situation when the coworker gets affected with any workplace hazard.

Secondly the OHS legislation considered the public concern regarding the work place hazard. This can help to eradicate the unnecessary thinking and myths that exists in the society about the work place hazard. Training of the employee is considered as an integral part of prevention of morbidity of employees in America. They just used training programs to educate the employees regarding the use of equipment with advanced technologies.

These training programs is considered as a good medium of communication among the employees to create an awareness of working and safe handling of equipment. This eventually helps to make the workers realize about what they really want to do. The training program also reduces the absentees the employees.

A commonwealth of insurance also came into being as a protection plan for the workers. This mainly includes saving of huge proportion of money that will retain in every year that can rebate to the workers in case of any occupational hazard. Another methodology taken by the management for the proper connection of insurance and to give the money back is by obtaining the safe agreement from the employees. (Mason, 1986)

CONCLUSION

Occupational health and safety legislation are necessary for the welfare of the employees. The management and the employers provide a sound basis for the reduction of occupational morbidity. Proper caring and follow up of legislations are a better way to reduce the work place hazards. Somehow the policies made by the management can also create a better way for the morbidity reduction among the workers. Standardization and safety promotion can be a good method to protect the employees. Morbidity can be of many types such as burns, falls, electric shock or the direct contact of hazardous substances. All this factors should be closely monitored and necessary action should be taken at right time to prevent morbidity.

REFERENCES

Gallagher, V. (2015). Moving Beyond Basic OSHA Compliance. Worker protection .

Mason, J. L. (1986). Long range implications for health and safety professionals. OSHA’s hazard communication standard .

Silver Spring. (2008). The construction chart book. Centre for construction research and trainig .

Stojšić, L. (2014). Adjusting labour inspection to contemporary occupational safety and health system . Department of Labour Inspection in Novi Sad, Serbia , 10.

Wells, K. (2018). Why You Should Care About ISO 45001. NEW WORLD SAFETY STANDARD.