The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration is proposing a rule that would require U.S. employers in higher-risk industries including metalworking and machining to submit more detailed digital records on workplace injuries and illness, some of which it would post online.
If approved in its current form, the new regulation would apply to firms with 100 or more employees in industries from metal production and processing to shipbuilding and vegetable farming, according to a draft published in the Federal Register.
An existing requirement that a broader swath of companies with 250 or more workers submit an annual summary of injuries and illness would be lifted, however, creating a more tailored structure than the one in place now, the agency says.
“The number of workers injured or made ill on the job remains unacceptably high,” with more than 3 million cases a year that necessitate more than first aid, agency officials write in an explanation of the reasoning behind the rule change.
“OSHA currently has limited information about the injury/illness risks facing workers in specific establishments, and the proposed rule would increase the agency’s ability to focus resources on those workplaces where workers are at high risk,” officials say.
Requiring covered employers to submit case-specific data would expand the agency’s access to information that companies are required to keep already on Forms 300, 301 and 300A, some of which OSHA can’t typically examine now without an inspection, the officials say.
De-Identified Personal Data
Since OSHA compliance officers are able to inspect only a small portion of U.S. workplaces each year, “and it would take many decades to inspect each covered workplace in the nation even once,” it’s critical for the agency to increase its impact on the “thousands of establishments where workers are being injured or made ill but which OSHA does not have the resources to inspect,” they say.
While almost all the employers currently required to track illness and injuries would have to continue doing so under the proposed rule change, only those in the more hazardous fields designated by OSHA would have to submit detailed reports to the agency.
Those industries, identified in a list of a little more than 100 included as an appendix to the draft rule, would have to submit not only the summary of injuries and illness they prepare now using OSHA Form 300A but also the detailed information tracked on two others: Form 300 and Form 301.
Form 300, a log of injuries and illness, includes the worker’s name, job title, date and description of what happened and the outcome, such as days away from work or restricted work activity.
Form 301, the Injury and Illness Incident Report, delves further into the circumstances as well as the employee’s background. It lists the worker’s name, address, date of birth and hiring date as well as the name and address of the healthcare worker providing treatment. A more precise description of where and how the injury or illness occurred is recorded also.
OSHA says it intends to post much of the information collected under the proposed regulation on the internet. To maintain workers’ privacy, it will exclude some fields on the forms – such workers’ names and contact information – from collection.
On others, it will use a process known as de-identification to remove overlapping data points that might identify workers indirectly, such as the names of their doctors or healthcare professionals.
The agency has received only limited feedback so far from a public comment period, which is required before federal agencies can finalize new regulations and put them into effect.
The initial comment period, which was set to expire May 31, has now been extended through June 30.
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I have worked in metal companies for about thirty years and I seen a lot of injuries and most was not paying attention and being rushed on job and a lot of common sense
50My experience working with a injured husband now dead, big does pay more to by keep out of trouble. Then caring just caring about a injured empolyee..
The fins from OSHUA IN itself a notice for #1. Help for victim safety
#2. For policy not correction for safety for employed person!
Called facing music!!
If your pockets are fat you would understand, injury a individual goes through to recover.
Sick of greed people acquire as they grow.
39I need to join
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