Focus

Focus Archive

28 April 2015 – World Day for Safety and Health at Work

April 2015

The theme of the ILO campaign for 2015 is: Join in building a culture of prevention on OSH.

A national occupational safety and health culture is one in which the right to a safe and healthy working environment is respected at all levels, where governments, employers and workers actively participate in securing a safe and healthy working environment through a system of defined rights, responsibilities and duties, and where the highest priority is accorded to the principle of prevention.

This year, the International Labour Office we will improve the SafeDay web page with new and user-friendly information to design your own campaign. You will be able to download a number of other key documents including the trilingual poster. However there will not be a report as in previous years. We invite you to visit our interactive web page as from beginning of April 2015. Please keep the ILO informed on the activities that you will develop in this context.

The ILO celebrates the World Day for Safety and Health at Work on the 28 April to promote the prevention of occupational accidents and diseases globally. It is an awareness-raising campaign intended to focus international attention on emerging trends in the field of occupational safety and health and on the magnitude of work-related injuries, diseases and fatalities worldwide.

Find out more on this year’s campaign: www.ilo.org/safework/events/safeday/lang--en/index.htm

Trade Union Movement

Every year more people are killed at work than in wars. Most do not die of mystery ailments, or in tragic “accidents”. They die because an employer decided their safety just was not that important a priority. Workers’ Memorial Day (WMD) held on 28 April every year commemorates those workers.

All over the world workers and their representatives conduct events, demonstrations, vigils and a whole host of other activities to mark the day.

The day is also intended to serve as a rallying cry to “remember the dead, but fight like hell for the living”.

Global: Gear up for Workers’ Memorial Day, 28 April 2015

The theme for Workers’ Memorial Day 2015 will be “removing exposure to hazardous substances in the workplace”, global union confederation ITUC has announced. The union body says the theme includes an opportunity for unions to highlight chemical-related hazards, asbestos “as well as the Ebola virus and other potentially hazardous biological exposures.”

It adds slogans, twitter hash tag suggestions and other communication tools will be posted on the ITUC / Hazards 28 April web pages. Europe-wide, the ETUC has already announced it will use the 28 April event to further its campaign on hazardous substances.

ITUC / Hazards and TUC 28 April 2015 Workers’ Memorial Day web pages.

UK Memorial Website

Look also at the UK Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents Memorial website: www.sheilapantry.com/memorial