Workers leave burning plant spewing toxic fumes.
Credit:AFP

More than 5,000 workers were killed on the job in 2016 and nearly 3.7 million injuries on the job were reported (millions more went unreported), the AFL-CIO’s annual Death on the Job report reveals. The death toll of 5,190 means 14 people killed per day just doing their jobs. Some key statistics:

Workplace violence deaths increased significantly in 2016:

• Workplace violence is now the second-leading cause of workplace death.
• 866 worker deaths were caused by violence, an increase from 703.
• 500 worker deaths were workplace homicides.
• Violence was responsible for more than 27,000 lost-time injuries.
• Women workers are at greater risk of violence than men; they suffered two-thirds of the lost-time injuries related to workplace violence.
• There is no federal OSHA standard to protect workers from workplace violence; the Trump administration has sidelined an OSHA workplace violence standard.

Latino and immigrant workers’ safety and health has improved, but the risk to these workers still is greater than other workers:

• The Latino fatality rate was 3.7 per 100,000 workers, down from […]