By Dr Lana Cormie
The 28th April is International Workers Memorial Day.
On this day, people gather across the world to honour our fallen workers. It is a dark day – one where we hear the names read out of the workers lost over the past 12 months. These names join the countless others who have already died at work, or due to their work. Behind each and every worker is a family experiencing immeasurable pain and suffering and a community left forever changed.
Too many workers are still dying at work and their loss is a measure of how unsafe our workplaces still are. These deaths are preventable and we must do something about it. It cannot be that deaths at work are accepted as ‘accidents’. Rather, we must acknowledge that we can and must do better.
We all owe it to those who have lost their lives and their families, to wholeheartedly commit to working towards the only acceptable number of workplace deaths – Zero.
