EU-OSHA targets health risks in cleaning industry for European Week 2009

Oct. 21, 2009 - PRLog -- During the Week, which is organised by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) hundreds of events and activities relating to safety and health take place throughout Europe. This second year of the Healthy Workplaces campaign on risk assessment has been focused on promoting campaign messages at sectoral level.

Almost 3.6 million people in the EU work in the cleaning sector, yet it’s often seen as a Cinderella industry. Every enterprise needs cleaners, but cleaning is seldom seen as a core activity, so it’s usually regarded as a low priority and often outsourced. Yet poor cleaning can cost the business, for example in the food and pharmaceutical industries where bad hygiene can result in companies losing their licence.

The sector is dominated by cleaning contractors, many of them small, who have to compete so fiercely for business that health and safety may not be a top priority for them. Yet, EU health and safety authorities classify the cleaning sector as particularly vulnerable to certain work-related risks, ranging from the danger of slips and trips to aggression from members of the public.

As part of the European Week focus on the sector EU-OSHA has brought out two new publications on cleaning: Preventing harm to cleaning workers and Cleaning workers and Occupational Safety and Health. They outline the particular challenges in cleaning work, including the poor public perception of the job, the prevalence of after-hours working, and exposure to hazardous substances.

Preventing harm to cleaning workers examines actions taken to overcome some of these challenges ¬- at European, national and company level. It covers common cleaning tasks carried out in a wide variety of workplaces from hospitals to cafes. Good practice examples of improving the welfare of cleaners range from altering cleaners’ working hours from night to daytime to reduce the negative effects of working antisocial hours, to a new database enabling the selection of the right grade of protective gloves for different types of cleaning.

To provide targeted, accessible advice on health and safety to the cleaning sector, EU-OSHA has also released a video showing a case study of an actual worker suffering from an ailment common among cleaners (musculoskeletal disorders), and explaining measures that can be taken to alleviate the problem.

Similar videos are also available for the construction and hotel, restaurant and catering sectors, which are also considered high-risk areas.

Finally, the film, Clean Sweep, features the popular animated character Napo tackling workplace risks in the cleaning and contracting industry. The film demonstrates, in an accessible and engaging manner, the common risks in cleaning and what can be done to prevent them.

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