Identification of the cause

It is estimated that it occurs at least 120 million industrial accidents each year in the world, of which 200 000 are mortals. (As much country does not preserve precise files and all the cases do not announce, one can suppose that the real figures are much higher.) The number of accidents fatal is much higher in the developing countries than in the industrialized countries. The difference is mainly due to the best quality of the programs of health and safety and with the improvement of first aid and medical equipment in the industrialized countries, like with the active participation of the workers with the decision-making processes concerning health and safety. The accident risk is particularly high, everywhere in the world, the minings, agriculture, the forestry and the construction industry.

In certain cases, the cause of an industrial accident is easy to identify. However, it is very frequent that there is a whole chain of nonobvious events which preceded the accident itself. For example, an accident can be indirectly caused by the negligence of the employer who did not ensure the training of the worker suitably, or of a supplier who gave erroneous information on a product, etc the fact that the rate of accidents fatal is high in all the developing countries underlines the need for programs of health and safety which stress the prevention. It is important as much to promote the development of the occupational medicine, in particular by training the doctors to learn how to them to recognize the diseases related to work at an early stage. Certain occupational diseases are recognized since many years and have various effects on the workers according to nature of the risk, the mode of exposure, the amount, etc Among the well-known diseases, one can mention: