Nonfatal Workplace Injuries Fall More Than 8%

Private industry employers reported 2.6 million nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses in 2023, down 8.4% from 2022, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said in a post on Wednesday.
Of these, 946,500 involved days away from work. Nonfatal cases involving days away from work occurred at a rate of 0.9 cases per 100 full-time workers in 2023, down from 1.2 in 2022.
Among those states with the highest rates, Hawaii had 1.6 cases per 100 full-time workers for cases involving days away from work in 2023. Oregon and Vermont each had a rate of 1.5, and Alaska had a rate of 1.4. Louisiana and Utah had rates of days away from work cases at 0.5 cases per 100 full-time workers each.
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The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said Wednesday that the proposed OSHA Heat Standard would result in “OSHA micromanaging workplaces, imposing unreasonable burdens, and creating confusion as to what employers would be required to do.”
In its public response to the Biden Administration’s pending rule, the business lobby urged the Department of Labor to withdraw the proposed standard in favor of one that uses “a performance orientation that will allow employers to tailor their protections to their geography, environment, workplaces, and workers.
Among the reasons supporting its position, author Marc Freedman, the Chamber’s VP, Employment Policy, argues that U.S. Chamber of Commerce, wrote that Congress has not spoken clearly on the agency’s “authority to broadly regulate heat.”
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The U.S. EPA and OSHA signed a long-awaited memorandum of understanding formalizing coordination on EPA’s work to assess and manage existing chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act.
The environmental agency on Monday said MOU calls for continuing existing collaboration on workplace exposures, as well as information sharing in the form of notification, consultation, and coordination where appropriate.
In a comment on the MOU, lawyers at Bergeson & Campbell said they were “a bit disappointed with the revised MOU’s lack of substance,” according to their blog post on Wednesday.
“Despite the passage of time and the buildup, the MOU is remarkably devoid of specificity and anything truly ‘new’,” they wrote.
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