Dr. Valéry Karl Wöll
The importance of occupational accidents for the society
In Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations General Assembly of 10 December 1948, the United Nations makes it clear that “all people have a right to life and security.” (United Nations, 1948, p.2). In Article 23 of the same Declaration, the signatories also concede that “all people have a right to health and good working conditions” (United Nations, 1948, p.5). If we recognise the human rights to life, safety and health, it is therefore self-evident that we must try to prevent occupational accidents, which are an interference with people's life, safety and health. In addition to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the national laws of the individual states require entrepreneurs and managers to prevent accidents at work (Bundesregierung, 2021b, 2023a) and the directives of confederations such as the European Union also require this (Europäische Union, 2008). An entrepreneur or manager who does not fulfil his obligation to prevent accidents at work is therefore not only guilty in a moral sense, but in most countries of the world also violates the laws in force in his country.
The United Nations also reports on progress in the field of occupational safety in its 2023 Sustainability Report and summarises the improvement of people's safety at work under the goal of responsible consumption and production (United Nations, 2023). Of course, secure jobs are also a prerequisite for achieving Goal No. 3 of people's health and well-being.
Occupational safety and the prevention of accidents are also important components of the German government's sustainability campaign "Corporate Social Responsibility in Germany" (Bundesministerium für Arbeit und Soziales, 2023). The CSR campaign in Germany is a part of the worldwide campaign to support the Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) standards. The fact that ESG topics are gaining in importance worldwide can also be seen in an analysis in Google Trends. Searches for Environment Social and Governance terms have increased worldwide by approx. 1800% in the last 5 years (Figure 1). Compliance with ESG criteria is also becoming important for the survival of companies because the European Union is making it more difficult to finance non-sustainable companies through directives. Compliance, measurement and reporting of ESG issues such as occupational safety to stakeholders like shareholders and financial institutions is therefore becoming a crucial strategic factor for companies (Henrich, 2022).
Figure 1 – Number of searches for ESG in google
The costs of occupational accidents for the society
In the year 2022 about 787,412 reportable occupational accidents (incapacity for work greater than 3 days, without commuting accidents) occurred in the Federal Republic of Germany (Deutsche Gesetzliche Unfallversicherung, 2023b). With an average of approx. 27 lost days per accident (Deutsche Gesetzliche Unfallversicherung, 2022) and costs of up to 400 EUR per lost day (Bundesanstalt für Arbeitsschutz und Arbeitsmedizin, 2007), the direct costs of reportable occupational accidents in 2022 for german companies amounted to up to 8.5 billion Euros. Assuming that non-reportable accidents at work only lead to one day of absence from work and we assume the estimated number of approximately 23 million non-reportable accidents at work per year in the Federal Republic of Germany (Chapter 1.3), this would mean additional direct costs of approximately 9.2 billion EUR for companies. In addition, of course, there are the indirect costs to society for the treatment and care of the injured persons and the lost revenue that would have been generated by the employee.
In the European Union, data on reportable accidents is also collected and published annually by Eurostat (2023). According to the October 2023 report, there were 3,347 fatal accidents and 2.88 million reportable accidents in 2021 with an employee absent from work for at least 4 days. The number of reportable accidents increased by 5.5% from 2020 to 2021, which is attributed to a normalisation of working conditions following the restrictions imposed by the states during the coronavirus crisis. The average accident rates of countries vary greatly, so that in 2021, for example, 4.3 fatal accidents per 100,000 workers were recorded in Lithuania, while in the Netherlands only around 0.4 fatal accidents per 100,000 employees were recorded. The average for the EU as a whole is 2.25 fatal accidents per 100,000 employees per year. The number of non-fatal reportable accidents also varies greatly, with 3,364 accidents per 100,000 employees reported in France in 2021, compared to just 52 accidents per 100,000 employees in Romania. However, the data from Romania in particular suggests that there must be a considerable number of unreported cases, at least in terms of the number of non-fatal accidents, and that the reporting system for accidents at work in Romania is very poorly developed. In particular, the fact that Romania, with around 3.8 fatal accidents, belongs to the top group of fatal accidents, it would be almost a miracle if the country, on the other hand, had the lowest accident rate in Europe. In any case, it can be assumed that the respective legal area also has a significant influence on the average number of accidents in companies within the European Union. Unfortunately, no data is available on the average length of absence of an employee following an accident in the EU. If one assumes that this figure is similar to the figure in Germany at approx. 27 days per accident and that the costs are comparable, one arrives at approx. 77.8 million days lost by employees in the EU due to accidents at work with costs of approx. 31.1 billion euros only due to the reportable occupational accidents at work per year in the Europan Union.
Globally, occupational accidents have an even greater impact on people and economic performance, as occupational safety systems and health care systems in developing countries are not as strong as in already developed industrial countries (Hämäläinen et al., 2006). Every year, about 350,000 people worldwide die in occupational accidents, while about 264,000,000 to 340,000,000 people suffer an occupational accident that results in more than 4 days of absence from work (International Labour Organisation, 2003). Since not all countries in the world conduct and publish accurate surveys on occupational accidents at all, the ILO Figures are based on extrapolations of data collected in 2003 from 175 countries.
This article is part of a Dissertation Thesis
DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.16114.11209
