For safety agencies and those advocating for worker victims and their loved ones, the sad reality continues to be that far too many people are being seriously injured or killed on the job in a worksite accident. Statistics show that work deaths are on the rise. There was a 5% jump in work fatalities in just the last reporting year, according to Illinois’ internationally renowned National Safety Council (“NSC”). Facts, Injury. “National Safety Council.” Chicago, IL (2024).
These are avoidable events. The worker-victim would not have been injured if proper safety protocols had been in place and duties of care had been respected. Currently, work injuries together with other preventable fatalities (like motor vehicle accidents) rank as the third leading cause of death in this country, surpassed only by heart disease and cancer.
For too long, preventable deaths and injuries have been called “accidents,” implying unavoidable acts of God or fate that we are powerless to stop. This is simply not true. NSC believes that together we can – and will – eliminate preventable deaths in our lifetime.
Workers Have a Legal Right to Be Safe While on the Job
The infuriating truth is workers have a legal right to be protected as they do things that bring tremendous profits and revenues to companies in all sorts of industries. There is no mystery here. Keeping people safe on the job site is methodically defined by industrial standards as well as established safety regulations like those overseen by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”).
Nevertheless, as many workers in Illinois and Indiana will attest, these duties of safety and care are ignored or disrespected in the workplace. Many employers and others with duties to protect people on the job from being hurt or killed by clear hazards and dangers simply fail to meet their obligations.
May 2024 Waukegan Roofing Contractor Example
Consider a recent example out of Lake County, Illinois. OSHA reports a Waukegan roofing contractor failed to comply with federal fall safety regulations that would keep its roofers safe. Repeatedly. So, OSHA assessed penalties for the contractor’s failure to comply with fall safety rules. These rules work to protect against fall accidents, recognized as the number one cause of death among construction workers.
The contractor did not pay those penalties. It disrespected the determination of the $365,000 fine assessed by OSHA for its repeated safety failures. Then the agency formally moved in federal court to seize company property to meet the obligation. After ten years, the company was finally held accountable for endangering construction workers on the job.
From OSHA Region Administrator Bill Donovan:
“Federal regulations require employers to meet their legal obligation to protect workers on the job. OSHA will hold employers like Herion and ECS Roofing Professionals accountable when they callously ignore their responsibility for their employees’ safety. Every year, too many construction workers fall victim to the leading cause of workplace fatalities in the industry because employers fail to provide or use fall protection.”
28th Annual National Safety Month: June 2024
In the face of an ongoing fight to make workplaces safer here in our part of the country and across the United States, the NSC joins with others dedicated to worker safety in the 28th annual National Safety Month in June 2024. Read, “NSC Highlights Key Workplace Safety Issues Throughout National Safety Month,” written by Robert Yaniz Jr. and published by OSH Online on June 4, 2024.
This month-long public awareness campaign is focused on four key work hazards: safety engagement, roadway safety, risk reduction, and slips, trips, and falls. Safety agencies like NSC and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (“CDC”) as well as members of the safety industry and advocates for worker-victims and their loved ones are all supporting a greater understanding and appreciation of the need for better safety protections on the job.
From NSC President and CEP Lorraine Martin:
“First launched in 1996 to educate and encourage safe behaviors at work, on the roads and in communities, National Safety Month is also a time to remember that keeping each other safe is one of the most important things we can ever do. At NSC, we know employers and individuals who encourage others to be safe at work, at home, and everywhere in between are preventing injuries and saving lives. Thank you for being a safety role model; the impact you have on others is immeasurable.”
All month, there will be safety resources available to employers and others with the power and responsibility to protect people at work that not only clarify the leading causes of preventable injury and death for workers, but give detailed education on each of the four focus areas. These are provided by the NSC as well as other campaign contributors, such as the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
NIOSH offers training, tools, and activities like toolbox talks, among other things such as its Total Worker Health® workbook, Fundamentals of Total Worker Health Approaches: Essential Elements for Advancing Worker Safety, Health, and Well-Being and its Small Business Handbook.
Fatal Work Accidents in Illinois and Indiana: Workers Remain at Risk
The continuing need, after 28 years, for devoting an entire month in an attempt to curtail the unacceptably high risk of death facing our workers speaks for itself. We support the dedication represented by June 2024’s National Safety Month. See, The Reality of Widespread Industrial Work Accident Deaths in Illinois and Indiana: Warning to Our Workers.
Why do construction workers still face the grim reality that they have a tremendously high risk of dying on the job in a fatal fall because safety regulations are not obeyed?
It is known that 37.9% of all construction workers deaths are caused by a fall on the job site. Still, year after year, worker fall safety laws remain our most violated federal regulation. Read, Fall Accidents on the Job: Industrial Workplaces and Great Danger of Fall Injuries.
And it is not just employers. There are others with duties to keep worksites safe from fatal accidents, like those who are required to place warning labels on products and goods from scaffolds to angle grinders.
It is well-known that warning labels save lives. Read, Warning Labels and Work Accidents. Nevertheless, just last month OSHA announced major changes to the legalities of the Hazard Communication Standard and its requirements for warning labels and safety sheets involving hazardous chemicals. It comes with the recognition that the second highest safety violation in this country, after the disregard of the above-referenced fall safety regulation, was Hazard Communication. See, Dangerous Chemicals and Work Injuries: 2nd Highest Safety Violation in 2022 Was Hazard Communication.
Employers and others with the responsibility to keep workers safe are failing to do so. Tragedies result and the only real accountability facing these callous actors are the wrongful death, negligence, product liability, premises liability, and other legal claims sought by worker-victims and their loved ones in the aftermath.
There are laws in Illinois and Indiana, as well as federal statutes that may apply in some situations, that provide for justice after a deadly work injury. Both the estate of the deceased worker-victim as well as their loved ones may have legal recompense for things like lost earning capacity, medical expenses, pain and suffering, and more.
For more, read:
- Wrongful Death Damages After Fatal Work Accidents in Illinois or Indiana
- Catastrophic Injuries in an Accident: Damages for the Loss of a Normal Life
- Loss of Earning Capacity Damages After Accident in Illinois or Indiana
- Who Can Claim Damages After a Work Accident in Indiana or Illinois?
- Who Can Be Held Liable for Construction Worker Accidents?
National Safety Month is important. Workers in Indiana and Illinois deserve better than what they are getting in the form of job site protection. Our industrial workplaces are dangerous and all too often, deadly. Allen Law Group helps work injury victims in Chicago, Chesterton, Columbia City, Demotte and surrounding areas of Illinois and Indiana. Please be careful out there!
