The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) has launched a new campaign to draw attention to the issue of dangerous substances in the workplace and promote the best ways of tackling the risks they pose to workers.
It highlights that, contrary to widespread belief, the use of dangerous substances is not decreasing in the EU, and the need to manage the risks they pose is as pressing as ever.
The new campaign aims to promote techniques for the proper management of dangerous substances in the workplace, such as risk assessment, elimination and substitution, by disseminating practical tools and case studies. It also focuses on groups of workers who are at particular risk.
"Many workers are unaware that not only manufactured chemical products that are labelled with risk and safety information can cause harm,” explained Dr Christa Sedlatschek, EU-OSHA's Director. “Other commonly used substances across all sectors – from working with flour in bakeries to silica dust on construction sites – can be hazardous if their use is not managed effectively. Therefore, our campaign raises awareness of all types of dangerous substances, not just the obvious ones, and emphasises the importance of risk assessment in all sectors as the first step towards prevention."
The campaign brings together a wide range of partners to help to spread the campaign's messages to micro, small and medium-sized enterprises.
EU-OSHA is also a partner of the Roadmap on Carcinogens, which aims to raise awareness of carcinogens in the workplace and the associated limit values and legislation, and to provide practical information on risk assessment and good practice examples for eliminating or managing risks.
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