Health and safety at work - Summary statistics for Great Britain 2020

HSE have released the 2019/20 injury and ill-health statistics. Here are the headline summary statistics:

In total 1.6 million working people were suffering from a work-related illness, which in turn caused 32.5 million lost working days. 51% of these working days lost were due to stress, depression or anxiety, 30% due to musculoskeletal disorders, and 19% by any other type of illness.

828,000 workers were suffering from work-related stress, depression or anxiety (new or long-standing) in 2019/20 which equated to 17.9 million working days lost.

480,000 workers were suffering from work-related musculoskeletal disorders (new or longstanding) in 2019/20, which equated to 8.9 million working days lost. Manual handling, awkward or tiring positions and keyboard work or repetitive action are estimated to be the main causes of work related musculoskeletal disorder.

111 workers were killed at work. There had been a long-term downward trend in the rate of fatal injury until 2012/13; more recently the rate has been broadly flat.

2,446 Mesothelioma deaths in 2018 with a similar number of lung cancer deaths linked to past exposures to asbestos.

65,427 injuries to employees were reported under RIDDOR. There continues to be a long-term downward trend in RIDDOR reported injuries.

29% of non-fatal injuries to employees are caused by slips, trips and falls. 19% are caused by handling, lifting or carrying.

£16.2 billion is the estimated annual costs of work-related injury and new cases of ill health in 2018/19 (excluding long latency illness such as cancer).

For a further look at all the figures you can find the full report here.