Today, Wednesday, 28th April 2021 is World Day for Safety and Health at Work.
This year, “Workplace Stress: a collective challenge” is the theme of the campaign of the World Day for Safety and Health at Work.
The provisions on occupational safety and health within Labour Act 651 are consistent with ILO Conventions 155 of 1981 on Occupational Health and Safety and the Working environment, and Convention 161 of 1985 on Occupational Health Services, which Ghana is yet to ratify.
The Safety and Health Bill has been in parliament over 3 decades, but safety and health is a matter of life and death. Most cases of COVID-19 in Ghana are work related.
The World Day for Safety and Health at Work 2021 focuses on leveraging the elements of an occupational safety and health (OSH ) system as set out in the Promotional Framework for Occupational Safety and Health Convention, 2006 (No. 187).
The world day report examines how the current crisis demonstrates the importance of strengthening these OSH systems, including occupational health services, at both the national and undertaking level.
In 2003, the International Labour Organization (ILO), began to observe World Day in order to stress the prevention of accidents and diseases at work, capitalizing on the ILO’s traditional strengths of tripartism and social dialogue.
This celebration is an integral part of the Global Strategy on Occupational Safety and Health of the ILO, as documented in the Conclusions of the International Labour Conference in June 2003.
One of the main pillars of the Global Strategy is advocacy, the World Day for Safety and Health at Work is a significant tool to raise awareness of how to make work safe and healthy and of the need to raise the political profile of occupational safety and health.
28 April is also the International Commemoration Day for Dead and Injured Workers organized worldwide by the trade union movement since 1996.
The annual World Day for Safety and Health at Work on 28 April promotes the prevention of occupational accidents and diseases globally. It is an awareness-raising campaign intended to focus international attention on the magnitude of the problem and on how promoting and creating a safety and health culture can help reduce the number of work-related deaths and injuries.
Source: Mybrytfmonline.com/Kofi Atakora
