ISO has approved the creation of a new committee to develop an international standard for Occupational Health and Safety. (OH&S)

This long-awaited standard will provide government agencies, industry and other relevant stakeholders with effective and usable guidance for improving worker safety in countries around the world.

Why is this relevant?

According to ILO statistics, 6,300 people die every day as a result of occupational accidents or work-related illnesses – this equates to more than 2.3 million deaths per year, with 317 million accidents occurring in the workplace annually.

The first meeting of the new Committee is expected to be on 21-25 October in London, and the ISO project Committee will be initially tasked with transforming OHSAS 18001 into an ISO standard.

The ISO project Committee brings together experts and appropriate stakeholders interested in OH&S management. The Committee’s job will be to develop a standard, following the generic management system approaches pioneered by ISO 9001:2008 for quality management and ISO 14001:2004 for environmental management.

Qualico will, of course, be developing our training, auditing and consultancy services to reflect any future developments in Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems.

If you’d like to find out more about quality, environment and health and safety management and external or internal auditor training courses, please contact us here.