USDOL Releases Injury and Illness Data for 2023
OSHA graph reporting on injuries and illnesses in 2023. The graph identifies 75,087 injuries in January, 69,960 in February, 76,234 in March, 68,867 in April, 73,769 in May, 74,143 in June, 76,379 in July, 81,734 in August, 74,225 in September, 75,583 in October, 70,958 in November, and 66, 054 in December.
The US Department of Labor recently released a comprehensive safety data set collected by OSHA, the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, detailing more than 890,000 workplace injuries and illnesses across the United States. As part of the Construction Center of Excellence’s ongoing Toolbox Talks project, we take a closer look at Washington State data to learn more about the trends and the details in this new injury data, all in an effort to improve future safety training.
Washington State data for 2023 shows 26,111 workplace injuries, with The Boeing Company reporting the greatest number of injuries with 646, followed by King County Metro, UW Harborview Medical Center, Amazon and the UW Medical Center at Montlake. The first construction-related firm to make the list, Lynden Door, Inc., came in at #48 with 77 injuries. The injury list is dominated by healthcare-related firms, transportation and warehousing companies. Tragically, 14 companies saw one workplace death in Washington state last year, with transportation-related fatalities making up the majority of that list.
In total, 1,068 construction firms reported workplace injuries, with larger firms reporting the most injuries. Sellen, McKinstry, Rotschy and Carmona lead the list with 52, 48, 37 and 36 injuries respectively. These numbers must be viewed with care, as the size of the firm, severity of injuries, sensitivity to reporting and myriad other factors affect these numbers, requiring close consideration paired with data analysis when thinking about which companies are safest. USDOL’s data users guide makes a critical point: “Recording or reporting a work-related injury, illness, or fatality does not mean that the employer or employee was at fault or that an OSHA rule has been violated.”
Part of the challenge in understanding the data is based on reporting, with some firms required to have 100 or more employees in specific high-hazard industries. The data does not cover all establishments, making insights not generalizable to the entire population of workers. More general data is available at the BLS Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses.
Despite the challenges inherent in the data, there are details that can help inform future safety training, including the Construction Center of Excellence’s Toolbox Talks. Similarly, OSHA states on their website that they, “...collect data electronically through the ITA to increase knowledge of workplace hazards, in order to improve worker safety and health and reduce the number of occupational injuries and illnesses.”
Take for example Washington State bricklaying contractors, who saw 16 injuries in 2023, lower than the nearby category of “Blending Wines,” with 28 injuries last year. The case details explain how workers were hurt. A few examples:
Left shoulder sprain from lifting CMU block.
Lacerated right hand from sharp edge of reinforcement bar.
Injured left shoulder while ratcheting load tie-down straps.
Mortar dust entered eye when loading the mixer with a bag of mix.
None of these read as career-threatening, but speak to the kinds of dangers workers see on job sites, and could in the future inform Toolbox Talks more precisely focused on cuts, carrying and eye protection.
As an organization dedicated to increasing safe practices on construction job sites, the Construction Center of Excellence will continue to review this data to ensure future Toolbox Talks meet the needs of industry, tackling the most common and most preventable hazards workers face. Accessible data allows the public to make informed decisions about workplace safety and health.
Worker privacy is essential, and to that end OSHA has redacted personally identifiable information. The age of workers is also not made public, precluding researchers from finding and researching information about young workers. Injury tracking data is updated quarterly.
Watch and learn more about how OSHA’s Injury Tracking Application Data works, read the recent press release and explore the Injury Tracking Application data and technical guidance.
