New HSE approach to work-related ill health considered

Severity of harm, not targets, looks set to drive a new HSE approach to work-related ill health. 

• New HSE approach to work-related ill health considered The HSE is targeting its occupational health activities on the most harmful, long-latency conditions, such as cancers, while "rebalancing" its involvement in stress and musculoskeletal disorders, and moving away from interests such as rehabilitation and wider wellbeing that are not part of its core remit. Health and Safety Bulletin reports. 

Also

Assessing the risk of lead exposure to workers' health A report from Stirling University prepared by Professor Rory O'Neill and published in Hazards magazine in November 2009 claims that levels of exposure to lead that the HSE, and indeed the European Commission, consider "safe" may be anything but. Health and Safety Bulletin investigates.

Chronic disease burden reassessed The HSE's overall strategy on occupational carcinogens, on the recommendation of the HSC's advisory committee of toxic substances, is to direct enforcement effort towards the general control of dust and fume as well as controlling known carcinogens such as asbestos. 

Workplace fatalities on the wane as HSE figures reveal record low The number of people killed at work has fallen sharply in the past year and is now at a record low, according to the latest figures from the HSE.