Ensuring Safe Workplaces

Health workers deserve safe workplaces. This means infection control and prevention so health workers won’t get sick on the job or infected with HIV or other transmittable diseases such as tuberculosis and hepatitis. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes that health workers face a wide range of hazards, including needle-stick injuries, violence, and stress.

IntraHealth supports governments to help protect health workers on the job, both in formal workplaces such as health facilities and in informal locations such as clients’ homes. We also support the occupational health and safety objectives of the Positive Practice Environments Campaign for health care professionals:

  • To adhere to safe staffing levels
  • To adopt occupational health, safety, and wellness policies and programs that address workplace hazards, discrimination, physical and psychological violence, and issues pertaining to personal security.

Sound practices for safety and health are essential in protecting health workers by decreasing occupational injuries and infections. These practices also can improve productivity and reduce costs. Improving occupational health and safety involves building a culture of prevention; creating a systems approach to safety and health management; and ensuring that the right to a safe working environment is respected at all levels. Finally, safety measures don’t have to be expensive: there are numerous low-tech, low-cost ways of protecting health workers in the workplace.

Related resources

Guidelines for occupational safety and health, including HIV in the health services sector
Positive Practice Environments Campaign
Protecting health workers’ rights
Guarding health workers and facilities in conflict
Promoting gender equality in the health workforce

How to help

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» Learn more about how we’re championing the health worker.