SafeWork SA has launched a campaign to raise awareness about hazardous manual tasks and how to avoid body stressing injuries. This is in response to body stressing injuries affecting more than 5000 South Australian workers every year, resulting in annual compensation costs in excess of $90 million.
The injury category, which includes muscle stress while lifting or carrying objects and repetitive stress injuries, accounts for 36% of all ReturnToWorkSA compensation claims since 2018. South Australian body stressing claims reached 6035 in 2023, up 8% on the five-year average of 5603. This is double the number of claims for the next two biggest categories — being hit by moving objects and slips, trips and falls.
The safety campaign includes a series of pages on the SafeWork SA website dedicated to this issue. The resources include general information on musculoskeletal disorders, information specific to duty holders, risk management tips and training advice.
Health care and social assistance workers (21% of total claims) are the most likely to sustain a body stressing injury, while manufacturing (17%) and construction (10%) are the next hardest hit industries. Males typically account for 63% of body stressing claims while workers aged in their 50s are the most likely to make a claim.
Six online workshops will be held from November and into 2025, to help businesses understand the risks associated with musculoskeletal disorders and how to mitigate them. Once a business has attended one of the workshops, they are eligible for a visit from a SafeWork SA WHS advisor to assess their workplace and provide tips to reduce body stressing injury risks.
SafeWork SA Executive Director Glenn Farrell said the data shows a need for more thorough risk assessment to identify hazardous manual tasks that enable effective control measures to be implemented.
“Businesses have a primary duty of care to identify, minimise or eliminate the risk of worker injury. The resources developed by SafeWork SA and the information sessions on offer are an opportunity to raise awareness about hazardous manual tasks and the importance of designing work activities that eliminate hazards and introducing adequate control measures that reduce the risk of injury,” Farrell said.
