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Summary
Health and Safety Statistics Highlights sets out the latest statistics on work-related fatalities, injuries and ill health in Great Britain. The key new statistics this year are 2003/04 data on non-fatal injuries notified under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR), along with injury data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS), and ill health data from the 2003/04 Self-reported Work-related Illness (SWI) survey.
Injuries
There were 235 fatal injuries to workers in 2003/04, an increase of 4% on the 2002/03 figure of 227 and around half occurred in the two industries of construction and agriculture, forestry and fishing.
The number of reported major injuries to employees was 30 666 in 2003/04, up 9% on the previous year, with increases in many service industries.
The number of reported over-3-day injuries to employees increased by 0.7% in 2003/04 to 129 143.
The rate of reportable injury estimated from the Labour Force Survey was 1440 per 100 000 workers in 2002/03, down by 4.6% on the previous year while the global level of reporting of non-fatal injury was 42.9%, an increase from 41.3% in 2001/02.
Ill health
In 2003/04 an estimated 2.2 million people suffered from ill health which they thought was work-related, similar to the level in 2001/02 (2.3 million) and 609 000 first became aware of the illness in the last 12 months, compared with 662 000 in 2001/02.
Around three-quarters of the cases of work-related illness were musculoskeletal disorders or stress but the total also includes diseases ranging from asthma and dermatitis to infections and deafness.
Several thousand people die each year from diseases caused by past work exposures including nearly 1900 deaths in 2002 from mesothelioma, a cancer related to asbestos exposure.
Each year an estimated 6000 people (uncertainty range 3000 to 12 000) die from cancer due to past exposures at work. Around 3500 cancer deaths are due to exposure to asbestos. For deaths other than cancer, in 2002 around 100 died from asbestosis and nearly 300 from other types of pneumoconiosis, mostly due to coal dust and silica.
The annual number of deaths in Great Britain from mesothelioma has increased from 153 in 1968 to 1862 in 2002. The latest projections suggest that the annual number will peak at a level around 1950 to 2450 deaths some time between 2011 and 2015. Deaths occurring now reflect past industrial conditions; deaths in males aged under 45 have been falling since the early 1990s.
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