Editorial
Preparing for the Year ahead....
February 2002
Sheila Pantry, OBE
Many thanks to everyone who has sent messages welcoming OSHWORLD as a portal to quality and authoritative health, safety, environment, chemical and fire information. Many of you will be starting the preparations for your special OSH event in your organisation and country. The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work are in the final stages of preparation for the European Safety and Health Week in which all Member States will be participating. The theme will be the prevention of psychosocial risks with a particular emphasis on work related stress.
The campaign slogan is "Working on stress" and as usual the Week will take place in October. Member States are free to choose which specific week, in the UK it will be the week beginning 14-19 October 2002, but as yet no precise dates from other Member States.
This month's FOCUS article on Stress and Mental Health from a health and safety practitioner Steve Walter tells how he suffered from stress and makes the plea for a better understanding of the problem. It is a timely reminder that as work pace quickens we should all learn to look around us constantly and see how others are coping.
The regular pages are constantly updated, with new events in the Diary of Events which lists training courses, symposiums and conferences in many places in the world on a wide range of subjects. Remember that even if you cannot attend these many events, speakers and organisers are often willing to share their knowledge. Look at the details - where possible, I add in the web sites of these events so you can request further information. And do let me know if you are organising any occupational safety, health, and environment events so that I can add them to the Diary.
Globally there are continually new titles, news items, new products so remember to look at the News and also use OSHWORLD as your portal to many hundreds of validated and authoritative web sites which you can find in the Country and Subject links we offer. Many web sites now contain vast amounts of information on specific topics, and it is not always apparent that some "nuggets of gold" are available. OSHWORLD goes "data mining" looking for such topics and you will see many entries in the subject links which will take you to these topics. All links are constantly checked to ensure that no "orphan" links exist. And you work smarter not harder if you bookmark OSHWORLD.... we do the checking for you!
Most information services have a reference shelf where you can quickly check the reference sources - so OSHWORLD brings you a collection of Reference sources.
Remember to look at the Products and Services on this web site and see what is new and updated, such as OSH-ROM, one of the world's oldest OSH CD-ROM which has thousands of records to good practices, guidance, advice and legislation from many countries. Already many organisations around the world are finding this source of information of immense value. Even if you cannot afford the price of all these publications and space to put them in at least you have a constant reminder of what is new. OSH-ROM is easy to use in your daily work, either via CD-ROM on your personal computer or on your organisation's network or via the Internet.
Click onto the various Bookshops to order any new document as they are being published.
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Remind everyone to make 2002 a zero accident and incident-free year in your workplace.