Feds issue warning to high-injury employers
Feds issue warning to high-injury employers
Information newly available from the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) in Washington, DC, and a watchdog group that uses OSHA statistics may help you pinpoint whether a particular client is likely to be inspected by OSHA this year. And the information also can help you spot clients that may have inordinately high injury and illness rates that could benefit from your services. (See box, p. 66.)
In a dramatic move, OSHA has identified 12,500 workplaces with the highest occupational injury and illness rates and is urging the employers to take action to remove hazards causing the high rates. These are specific companies, not just employer categories or types of industries.
And here’s great news for occupational health providers: The OSHA director is sending letters to each of these companies with the strong suggestion that they obtain your services to improve their workplaces. What could be a better time for a marketing call?
Those employers reported the highest "lost workday injury and illness" rates to OSHA in a survey of 1997 injury and illness data covering 80,000 workplaces. For every 100 full-time workers, the 12,500 employers had eight or more injuries or illnesses that resulted in lost workdays. The national average is 3.3.
Charles Jeffress, assistant secretary of labor for occupational safety and health, is sending letters to the employers, as well as a copy of the injury and illness data for their establishment and a list of the most frequently violated OSHA standards for their particular industry.
"Employees in your business are being injured at a higher rate than in most other businesses in the country," the assistant secretary wrote in a letter obtained by Occupational Health Management. "I am writing you both to indicate my concern about the high lost work day injury and illness rate at your establishment and to identify ways that you can obtain assistance in addressing the hazards in your workplace."
In the letter, Jeffress noted many employers lack expertise in workplace safety and health and welcome assistance by experts in the field. "You may wish to consider hiring an outside safety and health consultant, talking with your insurance carrier, or contacting the workers’ compensation agency in your state for advice."
Jeffress also recommended OSHA’s on-site consultation program as an excellent way for employers with 250 or fewer workers to address safety and health. The consultation program is administered by state agencies and operates separately from OSHA’s inspection program. The service is free, and there are no fines even if problems are found.
The consultation program can help a small employer identify hazards in the workplace and find effective and economical solutions for eliminating or controlling them. The OSHA consultant also can assist in developing and implementing a safety and health management program for the workplace. The letter told the employer where the OSHA consultation program in that state may be contacted.
The overall tone of the letter is stern and disconcerting. Any employer who receives one is likely to consider it a not-so-subtle warning along the lines of "we know where you are."
"I encourage you to consider these suggestions to ensure safe and healthful working conditions in your establishment, " Jeffress stated in the letter. "Please remember, however, that an OSHA inspection may still occur whether or not you use a consultant to assist with your program."
If your clients don’t show up on that list, you still may be able to determine if they are at high risk for an OSHA inspection by using information from an OSHA database firm in Maplewood, NJ. The company has released its most recent predictions about which of your occupational health clients will be inspected by OSHA this year, and it looks like plastic products manufacturers are the most at risk.
OSHA Data offers the list of top targets periodically after analyzing its database of OSHA inspection records of every workplace examined by the agency since 1972. The database has 1.9 million inspection records on 1.4 million companies and is updated quarterly with 9,000 new records. Occupational health professionals may be able to use the list to warn clients that they should prepare for an inspection. The likelihood of an inspection also might provide an opportunity for the occupational health program to showcase its offerings in prevention and compliance.
The inspection records used by OSHA Data contain various information, including the employer’s standard industrial classification (SIC) code, compliance officer identification number, violations, penalties and classifications of penalties, penalty payment timeliness, failure to abate, accident data, and how many hours the compliance officer spent conducting the inspection.
Every employer has a SIC code that identifies its industry, explains Matt Carmel, MS, CIH, CSP, president of OSHA Data. OSHA compiles an annual list of employers that are targeted for unannounced inspections, Carmel explains, and the list compilation begins by identifying SIC codes with an unusually high number of injuries. OSHA Data uses the same process to identify the SIC codes. OSHA keeps its list of targeted SIC codes secret, but Carmel says his company’s predictions have been reliable in recent years.
OSHA officials have confirmed to Occupational Health Management in the past that the agency does target certain industries for increased attention, at least in part by studying which SIC codes were associated with more injuries in the past year.
These are OSHA Data’s prediction of which employers are targeted for inspection this year in the manufacturing sector:
• Plastics products — SIC 3089
• Sheet metalwork — SIC 3444
• Fabricated structural metal — SIC 3441
• Metal stampings — SIC 3469
• Fabricated metal products — SIC 3499
• Motor vehicle parts and accessories — SIC 3714
• Construction machinery — SIC 3531
• Shipbuilding and repairing — SIC 3731
• Fabricated plate work (boiler shops) — SIC 3443
• Miscellaneous fabricated wire products — SIC 3496.
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