OVERVIEW OF

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH & SAFETY IN

MALAYSIA

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 Contents
❖ Safety versus health
❖ Historical review
❖ The various discipline in occupational health and safety
❖ Focus of occupational health
❖ Principal of prevention
❖ Occupational health services and resource person
❖ Safety issues
❖ Concept of Incident & accident
❖ Concept of Risk assessment
❖ Concept of Control measures
❖ Concept of OSH Management
❖ Principle of safety management

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 What is Occupational Health
“ the promotion and maintenance of the highest
degree of physical, mental and social wellbeing
of workers in all occupations; the prevention
amongst workers of departures from health
caused by their working conditions; the
protection of workers in their employment from
risks resulting from factors adverse to health; the
placing and maintenance of the worker in an
occupational environment adapted to his
physiological and psychological capabilities and
to summarize: the adaptation of work to man
and each man to his job “

-ILO / WHO commmittee on Occupational Health

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 Definition
❖Occupational Health Services means services
entrusted with essentially preventive functions
and responsible for advising the employer, the
workers and their representatives in the
undertaking, on..
– the requirements for establishing and maintaining a
safe and healthy working environment which will
facilitate optimal physical and mental health in
relation to work
– the adaptation of work to the capabilities of workers in
the light of their state of physical and mental health.

ILO Convention on Occupational Health Services(No.161)

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 Safety Versus Health Impact

Chernobyl explosion Mesothelioma due

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to asbestos
 Chernobyl incident

Immediate effect: 30
killed, 137 treated for
acute radiation syndrome

Caused >2,500 deaths

(Ukraine Radiological
Institute)

Cost $12.8 billion to

USSR

6
 Historical Review
❖OHS is not a new issue
❖Age of antiquity, Middle Ages and
renaissance
❖The industrial revolution in Great Britain
❖Effects of industrialization on community
health
❖Effect of industrialization on workers’
health
❖The First Factory Act – 1819 (UK)

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 Historical Review… cont’d
Medical influence

❖Acricola and Paracelcus (15th

century)
❖Bernardino Ramazzini (1633-1714)
❖Percivall Pot (1713-88)
❖Charles Turner Thackrah (1795-1833)

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 Relationship between Work and
Health
PSYCHO-
SOCIAL
SOCIO- HEALTHY
ECONOMIC
LATENT
GENES DISEASE

DIET CLINICAL
WORKPLACE DISEASE
ENVIRONMENT
DEATH
HABITS

PRE-EXISTENT OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH

HEALTH STATUS EXPOSURE OUTCOME

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 Worker and Influences around him

Relevant Regulations

Physical Chemical

Personal
Health

Biological Ergonomics

Relevant Policies

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 Focus Of Occupational Health and
Safety

❖Health Promotion and maintenance of

the highest degree of physical, mental
and social well being of all workers.

❖Prevention of adverse health effects

due to work

❖Improving working environment and

work to become conducive to health
and safetyt
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 Focus Of Occupational Health

Promotion Prevention
Occupational disease/
Accident

Lifestyle Factors at workplace

-Smoking -Hazard
-Alcohol and drug abuse -Working environment
-Hobby -Workstation

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 The Various Disciplines in OH

❖Occupational medicine
❖Occupational health nursing
❖Industrial hygiene
❖Occupational toxicology
❖Ergonomic
❖Epidemiology

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 Principal of prevention

1o prevention 2o prevention 3o prevention

Health promotion Early detection of Limitation of
Specific protection disease and early impairment
treatment Rehabilitation

Health education Health surveillance Disability assessment

Control measures First aid Rehabilitation
Immunization Emergency response plan Return to work
Universal precaution programme

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 Occupational Health and
Safety Services
Aims
1. Identifying and controlling occupational
hazards
2. Educating management and workers to fulfil
their responsibility for health and safety
3. Promoting health programmes not primarily
concerned with work-related injury and
disease

World Health Organization

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 Occupational Health and
Safety Services
❑ Health promotion and health education
❑ Health risk assessment
❑ Workplace environmental monitoring
❑ Control of health hazards
❑ To adapt work and working environment to the
worker
❑ Fitness for work assessment
❑ Medical surveillance
❑ Medical treatment service
❑ Provision of first aid and medical emergency
❑ Data collection and analysis

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 RESOURCE PERSON
Occupational Health Doctor
❖ Advice management on health legislation and
compliance
❖ Health promotion
❖ Conduct workplace inspection
❖ Biological Monitoring
❖ Medical examination
❖ Medical surveillance
❖ Assist in impairment assessment
❖ Notification of occupational disease and injury
❖ Record keeping

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 SAFETY ISSUES

❖Incidents and accident

❖Hazard identification & risk
assessment
❖Control measures and Emergency
Plan
❖OSH management system

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 ACCIDENTS & INCIDENT
Concepts
❖Safety
- freedom from risk or danger
- Control of accidental loss
❖Incidents : near miss & accident
❖Accidents
- an undesired events that results in harm to people,
damage to property or loss to process
- result from contact with substance (chemical, thermal
etc) above the threshold limit of the body / structure

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 What is a “Near miss”?
❖A “Near miss” is:
– an event which did not result in injury
or damage to property but had the
potential to do so
– shares the same root causes as an
accident. It is only because of chance
that no harm or damage occurred
– needs similar attention as an accident

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 Early Theory Of Accidents
(Heinrich -1930's)

Ancestry/social
environment

Fault of a person

Unsafe
act/condition

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 ACCIDENTS & INCIDENTS
structure of accident
LACK OF BASIC IMMEDIATE INCIDENT LOSS
CONTROL CAUSES CAUSES

Inadequate Personal Substandard Contact with People

factor Acts & energy or
- program Property
Conditions substance
Job factor
- program Process
standards
Profit
-compliance to
Environment
standard

The Loss Causation Model

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 Lack of Management Control
❖Management responsible for:
– Selection of workers
– Machinery and equipment
– System of work
– Information and training
– Supervision
❖The accident prone worker is a false
approach. It is like blaming the victim
instead of the perpetrator.

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 Contributing Factors To Accidents –
Immediate Causes (Symptoms)

The unsafe acts and unsafe conditions

can be categorised as follows:
1. Human behaviour
2. Design of equipment and plant
3. Systems & procedures including use of
materials
4. Environmental Surroundings

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 Root Causes Of Accidents -
Management (The Real Problem)

❖ Personal Factors ❖ Supervisory Performance

– lack of knowledge or skill, – inadequate instructions, failure
improper motivation, of SOPs, rules not, enforced,
physical or mental hazards not corrected, devices
conditions not provided
❖ Job Factors ❖ Management Policy &
– physical environment, sub- Decisions
standard equipment, – measurable standards, work in
abnormal usage, wear & progress measure , work-v-
tear, inadequate standards, standards, evaluation ,
design & maintenance, Corrective action
purchasing standards

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 ACCIDENTS & INCIDENTS
accident ratio studies

1 SERIOUS OR MAJOR INJURY

- includes disabling and serious injuries
10
MINOR INJURY
- any reported injury less than serious
30 PROPERTY DAMAGE

300
INCIDENTS WITH NO VISIBLE
INJURY OR DAMAGE
* Any accident has far greater number of incident
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 ACCIDENTS & INCIDENTS
accident cost (iceberg)
INJURY & ILLNESS COST
$1 • Medical
• Compensation cost

$ 5 TO $ 50 Building damage; tool &

Ledger cost of property equipment damage; production
damage (uninsured cost) delays & interruption; legal
expenses; investigation time

$ 1 TO $ 3 Wages paid for time lost; cost of

Uninsured
training replacement; decreased
miscellaneous costs
output; loss of business

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 ACCIDENTS & INCIDENTS
Investigation
❖Events leading up to the incident
❖Facts of the incidents itself
❖Relevant facts of what occurred
immediately after the incident
❖Checklist : who; what; when; why;
where; how
❖Record & report

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 OHS Related Agencies : In Malaysia
❖DOSH – setting standard, enforcement, OSH
promotion
❖NIOSH – training, consultancy, information
dissemination, research
❖SOCSO – compensation, rehabilitation, OSH
promotion
❖Ministry of Health – medical board
❖Others:
- Universities : UKM, USM, UM, UPM
- OH Departments in organizations:
Petronas, ExxonMobil etc

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 INTERNATIONAL
OHS RELATED AGENCIES

❖UK : Health Safety Executive (HSE)

❖US : OSHA, NIOSH; ACGIH
❖International Labour Organization (ILO)
❖International Agency For Research into
Cancer (IARC)
❖JICA
❖WHO
❖ICOH

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