Agency releases injury stats

• OSHA has released 2022 injury and illness data from over 300,000 U.S. workplaces, which is now available for download from its website.
• The agency requires certain employers under Fed-OSHA jurisdiction to submit tracking data on OSHA.
• Not all establishments are required to submit Form 300A data.
• However, electronic submissions are required from establishments with 250 or more employees that are currently required to keep OSHA injury and illness records and establishments with 20–249 employees in specific industries that have had historically high rates of occupational injuries and illnesses.
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Service workers in South suffer spate of injuries

• A March survey of 347 service workers in the US South found that a shocking 87% were injured on the job in the last year.
• The workers surveyed came from eleven states across the “Black belt,” or Southern states with historically large Black populations: North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, Virginia, Louisiana, Florida, Texas, Mississippi, and Arkansas.
• Workers organized under the Union of Southern Service Workers filed a landmark civil rights complaint against South Carolina’s OSHA, alleging that the agency “discriminates by disproportionately excluding black workers from the protection of its programmed inspections.”
• Of the 87% of workers that had been injured on the job, most had been injured “from lifting or carrying boxes, garbage or other items or from falling boxes and/or merchandise.”
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New Hampshire construction worker killed

• A person who was pulled out of a river at a New Hampshire construction site died, the Allenstown police chief said.
• The worker fell through a portion of th Pinewood Road Bridge that was being demolished.
• Witnesses said the person was pulled from the Suncook River and put in an ambulance, but later died at Concord Hospital.
• OSHA officials are investigating.
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Unions support Minnesota meatpacking bill

• Unions representing Minnesota workers in the meat processing industry are asking Minnesota’s U.S. senators to co-sponsor legislation that offers certain safety provisions in the federal Farm Bill.
• United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Locals 1189, 1155, and 663 recently called on U.S. Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith to co-sponsor The Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act.
• The bill would provide funding through 2027 for hiring additional Occupational Safety and Health Administration inspectors and related activities.
• The measure would also restrict an employer’s use of certain attendance policies under which a worker is assessed points for absences with progressive discipline imposed as points accumulate.
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