Young Worker Safety And Health
Around the world, nearly 250 million children, about one in every six children aged 5 to 17, are involved in child labor. Children can be found in almost any economic sector. However, at a global level, most of them work in agriculture (70%). Approximately 2.4 million adolescents aged 16 to 17 years worked in the U.S. in 2006. Official employment statistics are not available for younger adolescents who are also known to work, especially in agricultural settings.
In 2006, 30 youth under 18 died from work-related injuries in the U.S. In 2003, an estimated 54,800 work-related injuries and illnesses among youth less than 18 years of age were treated in hospital emergency departments. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health reports that only one-third of work-related injuries are seen in emergency departments, therefore it is likely that approximately 160,000 youth sustain work-related injuries and illnesses each year. The highest number of teen worker fatalities occur in agricultural work and the retail trades, according to recent data. Across Europe, 18 to 24-year-olds are at least 50% more likely to be injured in the workplace than more experienced workers.
Read more about Young Worker Safety And Health: Work That Poses Special Risks For Young Workers
Famous quotes containing the words young, worker, safety and/or health:
“There is no need to waste pity on young girls who are having their moments of disillusionment, for in another moment they will recover their illusion.”
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“Computerization brings about an essential change in the way the worker can know the world and, with it, a crisis of confidence in the possibility of certain knowledge.”
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“To emancipate [the slaves] entirely throughout the Union cannot, I conceive, be thought of, consistently with the safety of the country.”
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“Most days I feel like an acrobat high above a crowd out of which my own parents, my in-laws, potential employers, phantoms of “other women who do it” and a thousand faceless eyes stare up.”
—Anonymous Mother. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, ch. 2 (1978)