Work Accidents Kill More than AIDS – ILO

During the 10 days of the Summit, over 50, 000 workers across the globe will die from work-related accidents and disease, more than will be killed by war or even AIDS.
According to an International Labour Organisation (ILO) report quoted at the Trade Union Summit, the number of accidents, injuries and fatalities in the workplace is increasing.

Currently 250 million accidents occur in the workplace every year and work-related diseases affect some 160 million people.

This combination of disease and accidents claims the lives of over two million workers per year, leaving millions of family members without an income.

Spill-over effects, in terms of the environmental and health, can pose a dire threat to the community at large - the universally found scourge of asbestos is a case-in-point.
In addition, work accidents and ailments cost four percent of the combined total of the gross national product (GNP) of all countries on the planet, or the equivalent of the total GNP of Africa, the Middle East (including oil-rich countries) and South Asia put together.

The worst conditions for workers are in the developing world, where multinational enterprises hunt for the lowest environmental and worker standards in order to gain competitive advantage, the International Conferedration of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) says.

For example, the rate of fatal accidents in developing countries in Asia is four times higher than that of industrialised countries - certain hazardous jobs can be up to 100 times riskier in that part of the world. And most of the world’s workers have no insurance or compensation for death and disability.