Lecture 12: Health & Safety at Work (3pts)

Question 1

What are some workplace health and safety hazards and stressors?

Answer 1

Health Hazards:
- Physical Agents: Exposure to physical elements (noise)
- Biological Agents: Exposure to natural organisms (viruses)
- Ergonomics: Caused by the work environment (repetitive strain)

Stressors:
- Working conditions (workload, physical environment)
- Job type/nature (demands, issues)
- Life events (work-life balance, personal challenges)
- Management Practices (unfair treatment, lack of communication, lack of support, unrealistic demands)
- Financial/compensation issues (pay/benefits, job insecurity)

Question 2

What are the consequences of workplace health and safety hazards and stressors?

Answer 2

It’s costly!
- Directly: (lost wages, medical treatment, rehabilitation, etc.)
- Indirectly: (lost production, recruiting, training, etc.)
- & Injury/Fatality/Accident rates increase

Question 3

What are the 3 fundamental rights of Canadian workers?

Answer 3

1. The right to know about hazards in the workplace
2. The right to participate in correcting hazards
3. The right to refuse dangerous work

Question 4

Why do younger workers get injured?

Answer 4

• Lack of supervision and job knowledge
• Inadequate training
• Lack experience recognizing hazardous situations

Question 5

What are the different health and safety issues at local, national, and international levels?

Answer 5

Nigeria:
- Oil spills polluting their environments
- The big oil companies (Shell) are partially to blame but not completely the cause. They also have unfulfilled promises to develop the communities.
- Because of the poverty in this community, locals are turned to piracy of the oil and manufacture it in very unsafe ways. (crude oil spilling into the water, their operations are unsafe there’s open flames, gas, vapor and tar everywhere)
- The Govt has to arm/incentivize military to try and stop the pirates

Alaska: (Exxon Valdez oil spill)
- The captains crew was experiencing stressors such as exhaustion due to being under-staffed
- The clean-up crew had physical reactions to the toxic chemicals as they were instructed to clean it up without the proper equipment
- Overall the company was not prepared for a disaster like this therefore the cleanup was not well executed. The Alaskan environment and economy suffered greatly.

Fort Mcmurray Oil Sands:
- A lot of the employees (especially the young ones) are making a lot of money and spending it poorly. (drugs etc)
- They have some stressors such as isolation/loneliness due to being away from their families which causes depression and turning to unsafe outlets
- This also creates an unsafe environment for the local community
- The employer should provide them with options for coping by giving financial and mental counselling

Question 6

When is random or unannounced drug testing permitted by an employer?

Answer 6

Random Drug Testing Policies: (can occur only if…)
- The jobs are generally restricted to safety sensitive jobs/environments
- Substance abuse is present
- Incidents occur regularly

Unannounced (Safety Sensitive): (can occur only if…)
- An employee appears to be impaired while on duty.
- An employee is involved in a workplace incident or accident.
- An employee returns to work after treatment for substance abuse.