We now have health-focused input at the leadership level with the appointment of Catherine Epps as General Manager Health and Technical Services. Her team was formerly part of our operations group.
The team has three focuses:
technical services which provide advice and expertise
health which covers occupational hygiene and health, including mentally healthy work
health by design, which is the process of managing health and safety risks, both physical and mental, by designing jobs and workplaces with health and safety in mind.
For more about our announcement on an increased focus on work-related health, and improving work health and safety outcomes for Māori, read our media release.
Last year, we supported research by the Health and Safety Association of New Zealand (HASANZ) into the state of the current professional health and safety workforce. HASANZ has identified challenges including supply shortfalls, inconsistent competency frameworks, limited access to appropriate education and training pathways, and a need to improve understanding of what different disciplines do and their benefit to workers and businesses.
To address these challenges, we are supporting a number of workforce development projects, in conjunction with HASANZ and the relevant professional bodies.
COVID-19 is primarily a public health matter. Now that the risk of COVID-19 has been minimised our focus is on ensuring businesses meet their obligations under the Health and Safety at Work Act.
Check out our COVID-19 information which has lots of information including on operating safely in Alert Level 1, working from home, keeping mentally well, and supply issues around personal protective equipment (PPE) and respiratory protective equipment (RPE).
Workers in many industries use P2 disposable respirators, commonly known as ‘dust masks’, to manage the risks around breathing in chemicals and dusts like silica and asbestos.
The COVID-19 pandemic has increased demand for these dust masks, and as a result, many businesses have had difficulty obtaining them for their workers. The extra demand has also resulted in non-certified and inadequate RPE entering the New Zealand market.
RPE that does not meet approved standards may leave workers unprotected from harmful respiratory risks, and give them a false belief that they are protected. In May we issued a safety alert on non-compliant protective equipment to raise awareness about this issue.
A worker faced a life-threatening infection when some raw material squirted into his eye when he cleaned up an offal spill at Affco New Zealand Limited. The worker was not wearing any protective eye equipment. A month later he became ill with an acute bacterial infection and required emergency cardiac surgery to replace both the aortic and mitral valves with mechanical valves.
We have just released good practice guidelines on managing the risk of violent behaviour, for businesses and organisations in the health and disability support sector.
Managing the risk of violent behaviour for workers also requires a duty to support and care for patients and clients. Control measures cannot be at the expense of either worker safety or patient access to healthcare.
Applications for 2020 HASANZ Scholarships open on 30 July.
Scholarships towards tertiary qualifications in workplace health and safety are presented annually by the Health and Safety Association of New Zealand (HASANZ). Applications are welcome from health and safety practitioners who want to develop their career and take their skills to the next level.
Details of scholarship categories and further information can be found on the HASANZ website. Applications close on 14 September.
HASANZ virtual half-day conference 2020
It’s the conference you have when you’re not having a conference. HASANZ welcomes health and safety professionals, businesses, policy makers and educators for an afternoon, online symposium on workplace health and safety on 27 August. The programme features topical presentations and discussions, including:
managing health and safety in the virtual workplace
how Countdown Supermarkets managed health and safety through COVID-19
impacts of cannabis legalisation on workplace health and safety – what a potential “yes” outcome from the September referendum might mean
psychological first aid – identifying psychological distress in ourselves and others and building awareness and support strategies for mental health.
For more information and registration, go to the HASANZ website.
We are proposing changes to the Workplace Exposure Standard (WES) of 18 substances and the Biological Exposure Index (BEI) of 4 substances. Consultation closes on 28 August 2020.
You can view the documents for each substance and submit your feedback on the online form on our website.
