Report criticises HSE 'complacency' on cancer
Report criticises HSE 'complacency' on cancer
Work-related cancers will claim thousands of lives each year for a further working generation as a result of the 'shocking complacency' of the government's health and safety watchdog, a new report is warning. 'Burying the evidence' says the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has neither the resources nor the strategy to tackle the workplace carcinogen exposures killing at least 12,000 people each year. The University of Stirling report, released to coincide with an HSE cancer workshop on 25-26 June, says HSE's approach omits a range of occupational cancers, grossly under-estimates the risks of others and excludes entirely some of the most high risk groups of workers. 'HSE's recommendations for action range from complacent to non-existent,' said report co-author Professor Watterson. 'Its evaluations on cancer causing substances including benzene, cadmium, diesel exhaust and wood dust are error-ridden, inadequate and outdated, whole categories of workers known to be at high risk are ignored, and HSE cannot quantify and continues to neglect the risk to women.' Breast cancer, the major occupational and environmental cancer risk for women, 'is entirely off HSE's radar,' Professor Watterson said. 'The net result of this shocking complacency will be needless exposures and avoidable deaths.' The report puts the cost to the UK of occupational cancer deaths at between £29.5bn and £59bn a year, saying preventing just 100 of these deaths a year would more than offset the entire annual HSE budget. 'Burying the evidence', prepared for the Cancer Prevention Coalition and co-authored by Risks and Hazards magazine editor Rory O'Neill, calls for 'sunsetting' to phase out where possible many common workplace carcinogens, and a 'Toxics Use Reduction' policy to help wean companies on to safer alternative substances and processes. It says these approaches have worked well elsewhere, and have been supported by both workplace and environmental health advocates and industry. The coalition, backed by unions, safety campaign groups, academics and cancer victims' organisations, says the UK government should recognise work-related cancers as a major public health priority.
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