August 29, 2003—The Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s (OSHA) Boston Regional Office and the Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety have formed a strategic alliance for sharing safety research information and best practices for identifying causes of and reducing work-related injuries.
Liberty Mutual’s Karl Jacobson, senior vice president of loss prevention, said, “The alliance will focus on the principal causes of work-related injuries and how to give employers the information they need to combat them. Slips, trips and falls, for example, cost employers $13.4 billion in 2001, according to The Liberty Mutual Workplace Safety Index. The alliance might review the findings of the various studies done at our Research Institute on how to measure and control floor slipperiness—a leading cause of slips, trips and falls—and through the alliance, better promote the understanding of controlling slips and falls in the workplace.”
OSHA Region I and the LMRIS will work together to: share information about causes and solutions to work-related injuries developed by LMRIS research and OSHA experience, including hazard recognition strategies and analytical tools, cost-benefit information demonstrating the effectiveness of sound safety interventions; promote the benefits of establishing comprehensive safety and health management systems in the work environment; convene or participate in forums and roundtable discussions on work-related injuries to discuss innovative solutions in the workplace; establish lines of communication to assure that outreach resources are used efficiently to further the goals of this alliance and to keep both organizations informed about each other’s occupational safety and health outreach and emphasis programs.
