Workers at greater risk of illness
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2006-07-17 08:36
Occupational illnesses and injuries are costing China 100 billion yuan (12.5
billion U.S. dollars) in direct losses every year, a senior health official has
warned.
And the indirect costs could double the figure to 25 billion U.S.
dollars, said Li Tao, head of the Occupational Health and Poisons Control
Institute under China's Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The incidence of occupational diseases had become a serious public
health issue affecting social stability, said the Workers' Daily on Sunday,
which reported Li's call for stricter health and safety measures.
Li
called for greater public awareness of the health of migrant workers and better
monitoring of small and medium-sized enterprises.
Some local governments
had long ignored the prevention and control of occupational diseases, while
focusing on economic growth, resulting in poor supervision and law
enforcement.
"Many projects were launched without an assessment of their
impacts on occupational health and approval criteria were lowered in order to
attract investment," Li said.
More than 30 industries were involved in
occupational disease control. However, many enterprises, especially small and
medium-sized firms, had few or no measures to protect workers' health.
Scientific research and education of occupational health in universities
was getting weak and fewer scholars were interested in the subject. Most
occupational healthcare institutes were located in big cities in the eastern
regions.
These factors had led to a shortage of occupational health
professionals and great disparities in care between the east and west, big and
small cities, urban and rural regions, large and small enterprises, and fixed
and migrant employees, Li said.
Twenty-six in-service provincial
occupational healthcare institutes provided services to 218,000 enterprises with
toxic and harmful production.
On average, every institute dealt with
8,385 enterprises and every occupational health professional serves 4,713
workers. Employees in low-profit and township enterprises had no access
to occupational healthcare, and rural workers in urban cities faced high
risks of occupational illness due to their high mobility, Li said.
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