World Day for Safety and Health at Work is a day that was created to stress the importance of preventing accidents and diseases at the workplace. This holiday is designed to raise awareness about these issues, so that workplace-related accidents, injuries, and diseases can be reduced.

This day falls on the 28th day of April annually and is promoted by the United Nations, International Labor Union, as well as individuals, communities, work-safety organizations, and governmental bodies.

The History Of World Day For Safety And Health At Work

This day was created when the International Labor Organization began to observe World Day stress the prevention of diseases and accidents at workplaces in 2003. It was a part of the organization’s strategy on occupational safety and health around the world.

The intention of the holiday is to focus international attention on the problem of disease and accidents in the workplace to ensure that we can all work towards safer working conditions for all workers regardless of where they are in the world.

Facts About Workplace Safety

As we dug into the minutia of this holiday, we realized that workplace safety is a real problem that needs to be addressed immediately. To show you what we mean, we’ve listed some facts about workplace safety below. We think the following facts say a whole lot about the importance of this holiday.

• Every year, over 2-million people die from work-related diseases.
• Over 320,000 people die annually from occupational accidents.
• Over 160 million workers suffer from a non-fatal work-related disease each year.
• Over 317 million workers suffer from non-fatal accidents every year.
• Every 15-second, over 150 workers have a work-related accident.
• Every 15-seconds, a worker dies from a work-related disease.
• Approximately 66% of all work-related deaths occur in Asia.
• In the European Union in 2015, there were over 3,000+ work-related fatalities.

Observing World Day For Safety And Health At Work 

This is a day for organizational representatives and community leaders to get out there and promote this holiday to focus attention on workplace safety. On this day, media outlets all over the world also try to raise attention about this day, and private organizations concerned with workplace safety also try to raise attention about this day.

People can also use the hashtag #WorldSafetyAndHealthDay to spread the word about it on the Internet. If we all work together, then workplace conditions can be improved all over the world and no worker has to worry about risking their life or health in order to earn a living.