
The Risks of Dust Exposure Onsite: What You Can Do
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has launched a special campaign highlighting the dangers of dust exposure at work. The Dust Kills campaign has seen inspectors target respiratory risks and…
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The British economy is increasingly service driven, which means that more of us are spending the working day sat at a desk. Although many people will assume that office jobs are safer than working on a construction site, there are serious occupational risks here too.
The fact is that sitting at a computer all day increases the risks of developing long-term illnesses. According to research published by America’s National Center on Health, Physical Activity and Disability:
Another study found that men who spent more than 23 hours a week seated had a 64 percent greater risk of dying from heart disease than their active counterparts who performed less than 11 hours a week of sedentary activity. Exercise is still a crucial activity in the service-driven economy.
By being permanently seated, office workers are destroying their long-term health, storing up major problems for the future. As an employer, this should be extremely concerning – ill employees cannot perform to the best of their ability, and are much more likely to take time off work. These absences affect productivity, and ultimately your profit margins.
With the modern focus on occupational health, businesses need to address the sedentary workplace to protect workers. Just 30 minutes of exercise every day can help to reduce the risks outlined above – but free/subsidised gym memberships for employees probably won’t have the desired effect. Not everyone wants to go to the gym.
Far more effective (and productive) will be to find ways to incorporate exercise into the workers’ daily routines. By simply encouraging workers to move around the office more, or to use the stairs instead of the lift, they can be “tricked” into exercising, without using the ‘e’ word.
[Tweet “The reality is that your business must act to save workers from their own health-destroying habits in the office.”] Otherwise, we may be about to witness a serious epidemic of occupational disease, perhaps on the same scale and severity as asbestosis.
For more advice on how to get the sedentary workplace moving, or about assessing these dangers as part of your risk assessments please get in touch.