If you heard it was Construction Safety Week, many would assume it was an awareness campaign about improving physical safety on the job. You would be wrong.
Physical injuries and deaths on the jobsite used to be the primary focus of safety initiatives, but significant gains in that area have caused the industry to shift its emphasis to address mental health/safety. Construction workers have one of the highest suicide rates of any profession in the U.S., with workers more than twice as likely to die from suicide compared to the general population. The number of suicides in the industry is five times higher than the lives lost in jobsite safety!
Construction giant Bechtel notes: “Despite all our success in protecting construction workers while they are on the job, a devastatingly high number return to their home, their hotel room, or their residence camp, and end their own life. Construction workers contend with what some have called a perfect storm of mental health risk factors, including a predominantly male workforce, physically strenuous and stressful work, long hours, jobs often located away from home and family, intermittency of work, and, for many, chronic pain.”
In light of this, Bechtel pledged $7 million to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention to design programs specifically targeted at construction workers. The industry has ongoing measures to ensure physical safety and has now shifted its focus to a multi-year partnership addressing mental health.
What was important in the past may no longer be a priority today. Ensure your actions are based on evidence, not assumptions.
Thanks, Meg!
