The quiet killers

Exposure to dangerous substances is harmful to workers' health and can lead to serious occupational diseases.

Every year about 4,100 people die from a disease related to the work they do or have done in the past, the Inspectorate SZW wrote in a report. Almost 3,000 of those deaths are due to working with dangerous substances. More than a million Dutch people have to deal with dangerous substances at work. This often involves dangerous substances such as quartz dust and isocynates on construction sites, wood dust in furniture factories, diesel smoke in garages and welding fumes in metal companies, but also flour dust in bakeries.

Dangerous substances are quiet killers.

Disorders

The diseases people can get from the substances include asthma, COPD, infections, pulmonary fibrosis or cancer. It can take years for disease symptoms to appear.

Retirees make up 80 percent of all people who die from working with dangerous substances. ''Dangerous substances are quiet killers,'' Tamara Van Ark (former State Secretary of Social Affairs and Employment) said. According to her, it is a preventable problem. ''So we have to get to work."

Pulmonologist Dr. Jos Rooijackers says dangerous substances are virtually invisible. ''I often draw the comparison between your lungs and a vacuum cleaner. They both absorb substances, but there is one crucial difference: you can replace a vacuum cleaner bag."

International initiative

Tamara Van Ark

former State Secretary of Social Affairs and Employment

Substances

invisible.

pulmonologist, Dutch Knowledge Center for Labor and Lung Diseases (NKAL), Utrecht

From 2018 through 2019 the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) rolled out a Healthy Workplaces Manage Dangerous Substances campaign, aimed to raise awareness of dangerous substances in the workplace and the risks they pose, and to create a culture of prevention by disseminating campaign materials and carrying out promotional and engagement activities. HSElife NL and HSEQ Direct theme Dangerous Substances is fully alligned with this initiative and is developed in cooperation with the Dutch Focal point of EU-OSHA.