Accident Figures Research Articles

Industrial Safety and Occupational Health Strategies: The Case of a Water Treatment Plant in Ecuador

This research aims to establish strategies in Industrial Safety and Occupational Health (SISO) using the case study of a water treatment plant in Ecuador; preventive activities in this area are poorly developed, being relegated to the background for not being considered important for production processes, this reality is worrying because despite the efforts made to implement a series of public policies; the figures of accidents and incidents indicate that it is still required to improve the SISO systems, to ensure the life, health and integrity of workers. The methodology used is descriptive and correlational, applying the inductive, deductive and analytical method, in addition to the integration of elements and sub-elements of an Occupational Safety and Health Management System proposed by the Andean Instruction Regulations, Resolution 957: 2008, and the ISO 45001:2018 standard; the population of interest was considered to be the 59 people working at the Water Treatment Plant in Santa Elena-Ecuador, of which 24 were selected to collect data through a survey. As a result, the proposed strategies are on par with the ISO 45001:2018 standard, which includes all the necessary requirements that an organization must have to ensure the safe provision of its services, minimizing risks or accidents, and providing a safe working environment for people.

Estimation of Socio-Economic Loss due to Road Traffic Accidents in India

<div class="section abstract"><div class="htmlview paragraph">India witnessed 151,113 road deaths in the year 2019 and this alarming number is due to increased urbanization, motorization and per capita income. India is home to the 2<sup>nd</sup> largest road network in the world and accounts for the highest number of road deaths globally. Curbing the menace of road accidents requires tactical road safety policies and their effective implementation. The meagre availability of factual data regarding socio-economic loss due to road accidents is proving to be a hindrance to the ideation and implementation of the policies. The Planning Commission estimated the social costs of road accidents to be 7.9 billion $ in 1999/2000 which was roughly 3% of the country’s GDP and this value was revised to 14.3 billion $ in 2011.</div><div class="htmlview paragraph">Absence of data regarding the loss due to road accidents in the recent times, has been a motivating factor to estimate the socio economic loss due to accidents on Indian roads. Road traffic accident casualties bring about a great deal of human suffering in terms of social, medical and economic costs. The data from in-depth accident databases, police records, medical, and insurance and government reports has been utilized to calculate the loss incurred.</div><div class="htmlview paragraph">This realistic estimation brings out the magnitude of the loss to the eyes of the policymakers and public. The Human Capital (HC) method is used as the base method for evaluation of the socio-economic loss due to road accidents. The concept of Value of Statistical Life (VSL) and individual cost components from HC method are extended to the Willingness-To-Pay (WTP) and iRAP’s Rule of Thumb (RoT) methods. Irrespective of the method, the socio-economic loss for the year 2019 is estimated to be around 0.55% - 1.35% of India’s GDP. This reflects the paramount economic drag due to road casualties and highlights the importance of bringing in road safety policies to reduce road accidents, deaths and injuries. This study is one of the first to put the current accident figures in relation to the economic costs specifically for India and can be used as a basis for policy makers to further develop their studies to derive cost-benefit estimates for different measures.</div></div>

Abastópolis

This article aims to present the "Design of more human and efficient cities, using mathematical modeling and computational simulation" within the city of Bogota, Colombia. MIT's "last mile" methodology, in one Square Kilometer is used. It takes place in the largest food supply center in the city, where large transport conflicts are evident, leading to high rates of road accidentality on its peripheries. Abastópolis, a game with which the increasing of awareness in road actors is aspired through their playful learning, has been designed. As a result it is expected to obtain an adoption of the regulations that the city has for transit and mobility issues, thus demonstrating the reduction of accident figures in the area studied. However, so far the play has not been validated.

Análisis y clasificación iberoamericana de la accidentalidad laboral en la industria de la construcción civil

Millions of accidents and thousands of deaths resulting from work activity occur every year and 30% of this comes from civil construction. As to this sector is one of the engines of the Ibero-American economies, it becomes important to identify the behavior of the occupational injuries in the region. For this reason, the main objective of this article is the development of an analysis of Ibero-American occupational accidents in the construction sector, based on the results obtained from official statistical sources for the period 2013-2017. This article was carried out through quantitative surveys, statistical observations, determination of correlations and use of the multicriteria methods AHP and TOPSIS. The main results of this investigation were the characterization of the problem, an Ibero-American ranking of accidents and an analysis of the basic aspects required to the employers of each country involved. It was also possible to identify that in the period of analysis the region had an improvement in the fight against this problem, as there was a successive reduction in the accident figures over time.

Actitud del docente en estrategias de enseñanza en promoción de la salud en seguridad vial

Alrededor del mundo mueren cerca de 1, 25 millones de personas por accidentes viales, y entre 20 y 50 millones sufren traumatismos no mortales. En Venezuela 90% de los accidentes viales se deben a la pobre educación vial traducida en la adopción de conductas riesgosas al circular. En la prevención de accidentes viales la actitud del docente hacia las estrategias que emplea para enseñar seguridad vial resultan claves, especialmente porque de este aspecto se tiene escasa o nula información. Se determinó la actitud del docente de educación primaria frente a las estrategias de enseñanza para la seguridad vial, en una Parroquia del estado Trujillo, Venezuela, con importantes cifras de accidentes viales. Estudio descriptivo, transversal y de campo, la muestra estuvo conformada por 20 docentes, la información se recopiló a través de un cuestionario con escala tipo Likert. Las docentes perciben de alto valor la enseñanza de la seguridad vial como importante para promover la salud, sin importar la estrategia pedagógica que se emplee, en tanto que los varones restan importancia al hecho.

The causal effect of wrong-hand drive vehicles on road safety

Left-hand drive (LHD) vehicles share higher road accident risks under left-hand traffic because of blind spot areas. Due to low import prices, the number of wrong-hand drive vehicles skyrockets in emerging countries like Georgia, Kyrgyzstan and Russia. I identify the causal effect of wrong-hand drive vehicles on road safety employing a new “backward version” of the synthetic control method. Sweden switched from left-hand to right-hand traffic in 1967. Before 1967, however, almost all Swedish vehicles were LHD for reasons of international trade and Swedish customer demand. I match on accident figures in the period after 1967, when both Sweden and other European countries drove on the right and used LHD vehicles. Results show that right-hand traffic decreased road fatality, injury and accident risk in Sweden by approximately 30%. An earlier switch would have saved more than 4000 lives between 1953 and 1966.

A survey on fatal accidents for overturning of agricultural tractors in Italy

The government agencies that are responsible for labour safety frequently delay the publishing of the figures of the accidents occurred in agricultural sector, including those caused by the overturning of tractors. This is due to the time required to conclude the investigation of each fatal event. The elimination of this delay may not be possible. Thus, the statistics do not satisfy the requirements of effective surveillance of the trend of overturning accidents to implement prompt actions to increase safety. Many web portals have been created in these last years to support weekly or daily newspapers at the local level. A fatal accident due to a tractor overturning is considered to be a significant occurrence. Thus, from 2008 a web observatory was created to determine the current situation of accidents involving tractors that overturned. This method had a significant advantage for obtaining the trend of the statistics related to the main details of each event practically in real time, such as the age, gender and nationality of the victims; the month, day of the week and location of the accidents and the characteristics of the involved machinery. Eight hundred seventy-three fatal accidents were processed in Italy during the survey period. As expected, the average age of the victims was quite high (62 years old). 68 % of the overturning accidents occurred during field operations, and 32 % occurred during transport operations. Eighty-six percent of the fatal events occurred on slopes, but above all ROPS (Roll Over Protective Structure) protection was missing from 61 % of the involved tractors. In the majority of the cases, the tractors were old machines that did not operate in accordance with general and specific safety labour laws.

Bright Prospects

AbstractClouds, veils of rain, diffuse light, and a colourless monotonous landscape. It's no fun driving on a motorway in the middle of the night, with weariness as an additional passenger. This is a scenario that should be familiar to every car driver. According to a study made by the General German Automobile Association ADAC, our biological low is in the small hours between 2 and 5 a.m. It is a time at which the frequency of accidents noticeably rises. A reason for the increase is also night‐blindness, medically: hemeralopia, the reduced visual faculty at dawn and at dusk. Especially at times of increasing building activity — up to 582 German road sections were temporarily concerned in September 2016 — reduced perception of the roadway grows into an immense risk of accidents. With a number of road construction sites corresponding to nearly 150 % of the value of the preceding year, the accident figures might have reached peak values again in 2016.

The safe road transport system approach

Abstract More than 1,24 million people die each year on the worlds roads and between 20 to 50 million suffer from nonfatal injuries. The UN Road Safety Collaboration Meetings under the leadership of WHO developed the Programme for the Decade of Actions for road safety taking nations into the responsibility of improving their accident figures by the five pillars of a national Road Safety Policy, safer Roads, safer Vehicles, safer Road Users and Post Crash Care. It is this Safe System Approach that takes into consideration the land use, infrastructure and transport planning, road user’s abilities and limitations and the close cooperation of all governmental and none governmental stakeholders involved. Following the European Transport Safety Council's (ETSC) 8th Road Safety Performance Index Report on Ranking EU Progress on Road Safety; June 2014 Romania has made progress during the last 10 year but had still the highest fatality rate of 93 fatalities per 1 million inhabitants in Europe. [1] The contribution will present the main activities of the fife pillars with a focus on PIARC's Road Infrastructure Management tools to improve safety and function of the road infrastructure based on the experiences with the land use problems in Asian, African and European countries. A GPS based accident data system will help researchers and practitioners to improve their countries road safety. The report will show the important steps for safer roads which had been developed in Romania and how actions of short and long term measures on all five pillars have reduced the number of traffic victims remarkable in Eastern Germany after reunification and in addition how the hierarchy of motorways, 2+1 express roads, the rural roads and traffic calming in built up areas, have improved the economic development of cities and villages in a safe way.

Haptic Feedback to Assist Bus Drivers for Pedestrian Safety at Low Speed

Buses and coaches are massive Passenger Transportation Systems (PTS), because they represent more than half of land PTS in the European Union. Despite that, bus accident figures are lower than other means of transport, but its size and weight increase the severity of accidents in which buses are involved, even at low speed. In urban scenarios, turnings and maneuvers around bus stops are the main causes of accidents, mostly due to low visibility, blind spots, or driver's distractions. Therefore, there is an increasing interest in developing driving assistance systems to avoid these situations, among others. However, even though there are some solutions on the market, they are not meant to work in urban areas at low speed and with the sole purpose of preventing collisions with pedestrians. In this sense, the paper proposes an active safety system for buses in maneuvers at low speed. The safety system consists of haptic feedback devices together with collision avoidance and risk evaluation systems based on detected people nearby the bus. The performance of the active safety system has been validated in a simulated urban scenario. Our results show that driver's reaction time is reduced and time to collision increased due to the proposed low-speed active safety system. In particular, it is shown that there is a reduction in the number of high risk cases and collisions, which implies a considerable improvement in safety terms. In addition to this, a brief discussion about current regulations for innovative safety systems on real vehicles is carried out.

Legislative actions

Injuries and deaths resulting from driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI) have become a major problem in Thailand. Specifically, the World Health Organisation (WHO) reported that Thailand’s road-traffic death rate (per 100,000) was ranked third of 182 countries in 2013. To date, no research has examined whether the 2007 Road Traffic Act (RTA) has had a significant impact on DUI accidents since it was enacted. Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to evaluate the impact of the 2007 RTA on DUI accident rates in Thailand. Using monthly DUI accident figures from 2005 to 2010 obtained from the Police Information and Technology Centre, the results from an interrupted time series design are used to indicate whether the new RTA is more effective than the previous Act in preventing drug- and alcohol-related accidents in Thailand. The results supported the effectiveness of the 2007 RTA, but only in Region 10 (Bangkok), Region 1 (Nonthaburi) and Region 3 (Nakhon Ratchasima). However, it is important to highlight that even though the 2007 RTA was statistically significant in only three regions, the number of DUI accidents decreased in all 10 regions. Suggestions for future research are also provided.

Metodología para un Plan Local de Seguridad Vial

According to accident figures recorded between 2006 and 2012 in the city of Medellín, more than half of those killed in traffic accidents are bicyclists and pedestrians. That is why local authorities have the duty
 to develop and implement a road safety plan, coherent with the National Road Safety plan (Plan Nacional de Seguridad Vial, pnsv 2001-2016), established by the Government of Colombia through its Ministry of
 Transport, with the aim of reducing deaths from traffic incidents by 50%. A methodology is therefore proposed to diagnose, plan and evaluate necessary interventions to reduce the mortality of the most vulnerable actors on the roads.

Organizational Factors Affecting Safety Implementation in Food Companies in Thailand

Thai food industry employs a massive number of skilled and unskilled workers. This may result in an industry with high incidences and accident rates. To improve safety and reduce the accident figures, this paper investigates factors influencing safety implementation in small, medium, and large food companies in Thailand. Five factors, i.e., management commitment, stakeholders’ role, safety information and communication, supportive environment, and risk, are found important in helping to improve safety implementation. The statistical analyses also reveal that small, medium, and large food companies hold similar opinions on the risk factor, but bear different perceptions on the other 4 factors. It is also found that to improve safety implementation, the perceptions of safety goals, communication, feedback, safety resources, and supervision should be aligned in small, medium, and large companies.

Unfälle auf Reisen – die versteckte Epidemie

The risk of malaria and other communicable diseases is well addressed in pre-travel advice. Accidents are usually less discussed. Thus, we aimed at assessing accident figures for the Swiss population, based on data of the register from 2004 to 2008 of the largest Swiss accident insurance organization (SUVA). More than 139'000 accidents over 5 years showed that 65 % of the accidents overseas are injuries, and 24 % are caused by poisoning or harm by cold, heat or air pressure. Most accidents happened during leisure activities or sports. More than one third of the non-lethal and more than 50 % of the fatal accidents happened in Asia. More than three-quarters of non-lethal accidents take place in people between 25 and 54 years. One out of 74 insured persons has an accident abroad per year. Despite of many analysis short-comings of the data set with regard to overseas travel, the figures document the underestimated burden of disease caused by accidents abroad and should affect the given pre-health advice.

Observation-based proactive OHS outcome indicators – Validity of the Elmeri+ method

A lack of effective proactive indicators is probably the single biggest problem faced in occupational safety and health management today. Most proactive indicators presented in OHS guides and research papers are, in fact, activity indicators; i.e. they indicate what is being done in the organisation. Use of activity indicators is common in bureaucratic management practices. In modern learning organisations the focus should be on results, so that employees can use their own innovativeness to achieve set targets. Real-time outcome indicators are needed in order to be able to monitor and improve the effectiveness of OHS activities. Standards observation is a promising alternative for monitoring the safety level of an organisation. The objective of this paper was to study the validity of the Elmeri+ observation method in predicting the accident risk of a workplace. The study material consisted of 128 companies within the mechanical engineering, the metal industry and the electronics industry. Five observation rounds were carried out in each company over 3years, and the results were compared with the aggregated accident figures during the same years. The study showed that the correlations between the Elmeri+ index and aggregated accident-based safety indicators were statistically significant and considerable in practice. The company groups with the worst index values, i.e. lower than 75%, lost 3–4 times more working hours per worker due to accidents than the best company groups, whose index values were higher than 90%. The paper also discusses the advances and limitations as well as the success factors of the development of observation-based monitoring tools.

An Open Simulation Approach to Identify Chances and Limitations for Vulnerable Road User (VRU) Active Safety

Objective: It is commonly agreed that active safety will have a significant impact on reducing accident figures for pedestrians and probably also bicyclists. However, chances and limitations for active safety systems have only been derived based on accident data and the current state of the art, based on proprietary simulation models. The objective of this article is to investigate these chances and limitations by developing an open simulation model. Methods: This article introduces a simulation model, incorporating accident kinematics, driving dynamics, driver reaction times, pedestrian dynamics, performance parameters of different autonomous emergency braking (AEB) generations, as well as legal and logical limitations. The level of detail for available pedestrian accident data is limited. Relevant variables, especially timing of the pedestrian appearance and the pedestrian's moving speed, are estimated using assumptions. The model in this article uses the fact that a pedestrian and a vehicle in an accident must have been in the same spot at the same time and defines the impact position as a relevant accident parameter, which is usually available from accident data. The calculations done within the model identify the possible timing available for braking by an AEB system as well as the possible speed reduction for different accident scenarios as well as for different system configurations. Results: The simulation model identifies the lateral impact position of the pedestrian as a significant parameter for system performance, and the system layout is designed to brake when the accident becomes unavoidable by the vehicle driver. Scenarios with a pedestrian running from behind an obstruction are the most demanding scenarios and will very likely never be avoidable for all vehicle speeds due to physical limits. Scenarios with an unobstructed person walking will very likely be treatable for a wide speed range for next generation AEB systems.

Worker influence on voluntary OHS management systems – A review of its ends and means

Voluntary management systems (MS) might improve occupational health and safety (OHS). MSs, as with any OHS management, requires worker influence (and management commitment) to reduce risks at work. Influence through union backed safety representatives (or similar) achieves the best OHS results. However, a MS guarantees neither effective OHS management nor strong worker influence. Systematic violations of legal requirements have repeatedly caused accidents at workplaces with certified MSs. Why employers introduce MS’s can affect their implementation and outcomes. Internal objectives, of productivity and/or work-related health, require upstream prevention and a genuine influence by workers and their safety representatives. However, managers with external objectives for a MS, such as brand images or low reported accident figures, may pursue such objectives through downstream control of safe behaviour – sometimes suppressing accident reporting – and with little attention to more serious long-term diseases. Worker consultation may then be a limited means of enhancing safety, or to one-way communication on safety rules. Such consultation may even be used for union busting. Many trade unions welcome MSs as possible improvement instruments, but they are also wary of what MSs employers are actually trying to implement. Unions try to support their safety representatives’ influence in a MS by enhancing their rights and their competences. If the motives for MSs are mainly external and the opportunities for influence too limited, it may be better for unions not to cooperate with management in a MS that may lead more to manipulation than to safe and sound work.

Health and Safety Management within Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs) in Developing Countries: Study of Contextual Influences

Considerable attention has been focused on addressing construction health and safety risks in developed economies. Sadly, the same cannot be said of developing countries in Sub-Saharan Africa where accident figures are extremely high. The aim of this study is to examine the influence of the contextual environment within which Ghanaian construction small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) manage occupational health and safety (OH&S). A questionnaire survey was administered to construction SMEs to better understand the health and safety management practices and associated problems followed up by field interviews to explore key issues identified by the survey. The results of the study highlight the institutional structure for implementing OH&S standards, prevailing economic climate, and extended family culture as challenges to the management of OH&S. The study identifies low literacy levels, low socioeconomic status of workers, owner/managers’ ignorance of their OH&S responsibilities, commitment to extende...

A new-generation safety contest in the construction industry – A long-term evaluation of a real-life intervention

A new-generation safety campaign has been taking place in southern Finland since 1997. The Finnish Construction Employer’s Association together with trade unions, safety inspectorates, and other institutions have been organising a safety contest based on the standardised TR-observation method. Safety inspectors conduct evaluation visits without previous notice to the sites, and best performing companies and sites are rewarded at annually held public seminars. Even though participation is voluntary, more than 70% of the total number of construction sites in the target area have participated in the contest, and the results have been successful. Deficiencies in protection against falling have decreased by 63%, in order and tidiness by 69%, and in working habits by 51%. The effectiveness is also evident in the accident figures. An estimated 4000 accidents and three fatalities are prevented each year, while other parts of the country during the same period show no improvement in accident risk. A key success factor may be the adoption among firms of a new, standardised safety monitoring method which has been used effectively by senior management teams. The method employs a combination of penalties and incentives in order to set and enforce new safety targets. Another success factor is the close co-operation between the construction industry, labour organisations and safety authorities.

ROAD ACCIDENTS IN INDONESIA

The World Health Organization (WHO) revealed that almost half of the 1.27 million people who die in road traffic accidents every year around the world were pedestrians, motorcyclists and cyclists. A study has also revealed that most of the people who were killed in road accidents in Indonesia were riders of two or three-wheel vehicles, which is about 61%. Next were pedestrians (15%), cyclists (13%), passengers of 4-wheel vehicles (4%) and drivers of 4-wheel vehicles (3%), as recorded by National Police in 2008, in three provinces. In spite of the high growth rate of traffic accidents in Indonesia, the data and information acquisition remains difficult. Data or information may be collected from many different sources such as the police department, hospitals, and also insurance companies. However, different figures may come up due to somewhat different definitions of accident victims, e.g., the police department may define death/casualty as a person who dies at the accident scene and at the time of accident. While a hospital may have a different definition on such a death/casualty, in which itudoes not have to be person who dies on the spot and at the time of an accident. Such a person may die in hospital after sometime, whereas such definition may be adopted by anuinsurance company. Figures of accidents in many cities in Indonesia, especially big cities such as Jakarta, may have similar trends due to inherent fundamental problems of an imbalanceubetween supply and demand of traffic systems. Furthermore, data and information about accidents presented is based on reports from three representative provinces, namely Jakarta, Jambi and West Java.