SEATTLE (Recycling Monster): Waste and recycling jobs remain a potentially hazardous occupation, despite ongoing efforts to get out of the top 10 deadliest job category by investing in more safety training and technology for vehicles and facilities.
The only occupations that had higher fatality rates in 2023 were logging, fishing and hunting and roofing.
BLS reported 5,283 total fatal work injuries in the U.S. during 2023 across all industries, which was a 3.7% decrease from 2022. The entity also cautioned that it recently changed aspects of its methodology, which may not make the 2023 directly comparable in all cases.
Nationally, transportation incidents were the most common type of fatality event across all jobs, accounting for 36.8% of the total. This was also the case for the solid waste collection category, in which 24 of the 35 fatalities were attributed to transportation incidents. Another four were attributed to exposure to harmful substances or environments, with no further details reported on the remainder.
The broader waste management and remediation services category had 87 fatalities in 2023; up from 61 in 2022.
That category also includes other jobs beyond solid waste collection, landfills and MRFs. The hazardous waste treatment and disposal category had 10 fatalities, followed by seven in remediation services and 16 in other waste management categories, including septic tanks.
This BLS data follows the recent publication of injury and illness rates. While injury rates declined for waste workers in 2023, illness rates increased.
Courtesy: www.wastedive.com