Some interesting notes on fatalities in the workplace
Assaults and homicide were the third leading cause of on-the-job fatalities in 2010 and have been among the top four causes since at least 1992, Bureau of Labor Statistics data show. In 2010, only traffic accidents and falls resulted in more workplace deaths.
Violent acts led to 506 on-the-job deaths in 2010, 18 percent of the 4,547 workplace fatalities. For women, however, violence was the greatest workplace threat, responsible for 26 percent of the 355 deaths. For men, it was 10 percent.
Recent inspection of a psychiatric hospital had uncovered more than 90 incidents in which employees had been assaulted by patients from 2008 through 2010 and that this year OSHA cited medical facilities in Massachusetts and New York for the deaths of workers. These incidents and others like them can be avoided or decreased if employers take appropriate precautions to protect their workers.
The number of fatal injuries among wage and salary workers
increased by 2 percent in 2010.
Work-related fatalities resulting from fires more than doubled from 53 in 2009 to 109 in 2010–the highest count since 2003.
The number of fatal workplace injuries among police officers increased by 40 percent, from 96 in 2009 to 134 in 2010.
The number of fatal work injuries among protective service occupations increased by 6 percent in 2010 after two years of declines. The increase was led by fatalities among police officers which rose 40 percent from 96 to 134 in 2010. Of the 134 fatal work injuries among police officers, 57 involved highway incidents and 48 involved homicides. Most other subgroups in the protective service occupational group declined in 2010.
Fatal work injuries involving workers in transportation and material moving occupations were higher by 5 percent in 2010 and accounted for about one quarter of all occupational fatalities. Driver/sales workers and truck drivers, the subgroup with the highest number of fatal work injuries within the transportation and material moving group, led the increase. Fatalities in this subgroup rose from 647 in 2009 to 683 in 2010, an increase of 6 percent.
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