| Abstract |
The meeting, 28th International Congress on Occupational Health: Renewing a Century of Commitment to a Healthy, Safe, and Productive Working Life, was held in Milan, Italy June 11-16, 2006. This Congress is the triennial meeting of the International Commission on Occupational Health, the only international body of scholars and practitioners in the field. Worldwide workplace fatalities, injuries, and illnesses remain at unacceptably high levels and involve enormous and unnecessary health burden, suffering, and substantial economic loss. The World Health Organization and International Labour Organization estimate two million work-related deaths worldwide and the trend seems to be rising. In addition, each year there are some 268 million non-fatal workplace accidents in which the victims miss at least three days of work as a result, as well as 160 million new cases of work-related illness. The most common workplace illnesses are cancers from exposure to hazardous substances, musculoskeletal diseases, respiratory diseases, hearing loss, circulatory diseases, and communicable diseases caused by exposure to pathogens. In many industrialized countries, where the number of deaths from work-related accidents has been falling, deaths from occupational disease, notably asbestosis, continues to be on the rise. An average of 16 American workers die each day from injuries on the job (in 2000, there were 5915 fatal work injuries). Even the most conservative estimates find that about 137 additional workers die each day from workplace diseases. |
