Psychosocial risks and ethical implications of technology: considerations for decent work.

Decent work, a United Nations Sustainable Development Goal, is built on the ethical treatment of workers and ensures respect of their security, freedom, equity, and dignity. In the future, a wide range of technological forces may pose significant impediments to the availability and quality of decent work. This paper applies a prescriptive taxonomy to categorize evidence of the psychosocial impacts technology may bring to the future of work and elucidate the associated ethical concerns.

Furthering decent work by expanding the role of occupational safety and health.

Background: The International Labour Organization (ILO) and the United Nations (UN) have promoted the concept of decent work as a Sustainable Development Goal for 2030 to address critical global problems. Occupational safety and health (OSH) are components of decent work, primarily through the ILO social protection objective of the goal, and are linked to various other objectives.

Objective: This Commentary applies a previously published staging framework to stimulate thinking about how the OSH field can contribute further to the achievement of decent work.

An urgent call to address work-related psychosocial hazards and improve worker well-being.

Work-related psychosocial hazards are on the verge of surpassing many other occupational hazards in their contribution to ill-health, injury, disability, direct and indirect costs, and impact on business and national productivity. The risks associated with exposure to psychosocial hazards at work are compounded by the increasing background prevalence of mental health disorders in the working-age population. The extensive and cumulative impacts of these exposures represent an alarming public health problem that merits immediate, increased attention.

Responsible Development of Emerging Technologies: Extensions and Lessons From Nanotechnology for Worker Protection.

Objectives: This paper identifies approaches to the responsible development of emerging technologies to secure worker safety and health.

Methods: A retrospective analysis was used to describe the history of the responsible development of worker protection from engineered nanomaterials. Lessons from that history were extended and applied to emerging technologies and illustrated in three examples: advanced manufacturing, synthetic biology, and artificial intelligence.

Occupational Medicine and Total Worker Health®: from preventing health and safety risks in the workplace to promoting health for the total well-being of the worker.

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of Public Health interventions for global social and economic development. Still, the community's well-being depends on each individual's health. In addition to pandemics, health conditions can be altered by chronic degenerative diseases, aging, disabilities, and work.

Expanding the Focus of Occupational Safety and Health: Lessons from a Series of Linked Scientific Meetings.

There is widespread recognition that the world of work is changing, and agreement is growing that the occupational safety and health (OSH) field must change to contribute to the protection of workers now and in the future. Discourse on the evolution of OSH has been active for many decades, but formalized support of an expanded focus for OSH has greatly increased over the past 20 years. Development of approaches such as the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)'s Total Worker Health concept and the World Health Organization (WHO)'s Healthy Workplace Framework are concrete examples of how OSH can incorporate a new focus with a wider view.

In Search of a Value Proposition for COVID-19 Testing in the Work Environment: A Social Marketing Analysis.

Background: This study examined employer experience with SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) asymptomatic testing through a social marketing lens. Social marketing uses commercial marketing principles to achieve socially beneficial ends including improved health and safety behavior.

Method: Twenty employers across 11 occupational sectors were interviewed about implementation of COVID-19 testing from January through April 2021.

Barriers to SARS-CoV-2 Testing among U.S. Employers in the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Qualitative Analysis Conducted January through April 2021.

During the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. companies were seeking ways to support their employees to return to the workplace.

Occupational Safety and Health Staging Framework for Decent Work.

The 2030 United Nations Goal 8 for sustainable development focuses on decent work. There is utility in identifying the occupational safety and health aspects of Goal 8, as they pertain to the four pillars of decent work: job creation, social protection, rights of workers, and social dialogue. A workgroup of the International Commission on Occupational Health and collaborators addressed the issue of decent work and occupational safety and health (OSH) with the objective of elaborating a framework for guidance for practitioners, researchers, employers, workers, and authorities.

Applying Translational Science Approaches to Protect Workers Exposed to Nanomaterials.

Like nanotechnology, translational science is a relatively new and transdisciplinary field. Translational science in occupational safety and health (OSH) focuses on the process of taking scientific knowledge for the protection of workers from the lab to the field (i.e.

Public Health Impacts of Underemployment and Unemployment in the United States: Exploring Perceptions, Gaps and Opportunities.

Background: Unemployment, underemployment, and the quality of work are national occupational health risk factors that drive critical national problems; however, to date, there have been no systematic efforts to document the public health impact of this situation.

Methods: An environmental scan was conducted to explore the root causes and health impacts of underemployment and unemployment and highlight multilevel perspectives and factors in the landscape of underemployment and unemployment.

Methods: included a review of gray literature and research literature, followed by key informant interviews with nine organizational representatives in employment research and policy, workforce development, and industry to assess perceived needs and gaps in practice.

Aging and the Future of Decent Work.

The United Nations identified decent work and economic growth as a sustainable development goal for 2030. Decent work is a term that sums up aspirations for people in their working lives. One of the factors that influences the achievement of decent work is aging.

How Will the Future of Work Shape OSH Research and Practice? A Workshop Summary.

Growth of the information economy and globalization of labor markets will be marked by exponential growth in emerging technologies that will cause considerable disruption of the social and economic sectors that drive the global job market. These disruptions will alter the way we work, where we work, and will be further affected by the changing demographic characteristics and level of training of the available workforce. These changes will likely result in scenarios where existing workplace hazards are exacerbated and new hazards with unknown health effects are created.

How Will the Future of Work Shape the OSH Professional of the Future? A Workshop Summary.

Rapid and profound changes anticipated in the future of work will have significant implications for the education and training of occupational safety and health (OSH) professionals and the workforce. As the nature of the workplace, work, and the workforce change, the OSH field must expand its focus to include existing and new hazards (some yet unknown), consider how to protect the health and well-being of a diverse workforce, and understand and mitigate the safety implications of new work arrangements. Preparing for these changes is critical to developing proactive systems that can protect workers, prevent injury and illness, and promote worker well-being.

Potential Scenarios and Hazards in the Work of the Future: A Systematic Review of the Peer-Reviewed and Gray Literatures.

It would be useful for researchers, practitioners, and decision-makers to anticipate the hazards that workers will face in the future. The focus of this study is a systematic review of published information to identify and characterize scenarios and hazards in the future of work. Eleven bibliographic databases were systematically searched for papers and reports published from 1999 to 2019 that described future of work scenarios or identified future work-related hazards.

Toward an Expanded Focus for Occupational Safety and Health: A Commentary.

Powerful and ongoing changes in how people work, the workforce, and the workplace require a more holistic view of each of these. We argue that an expanded focus for occupational safety and health (OSH) is necessary to prepare for and respond rapidly to future changes in the world of work that will certainly challenge traditional OSH systems. The WHO Model for Action, various European efforts at well-being, and the Total Worker Health concept provide a foundation for addressing changes in the world of work.

Wholesale and retail trade sector occupational fatal and nonfatal injuries and illnesses from 2006 to 2016: Implications for intervention.

Background: We analyzed the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) fatal and nonfatal injuries and illness data on U.S. workers in the wholesale and retail trade (WRT) sector from 2006 to 2016.

An Exploratory Assessment of Applying Risk Management Practices to Engineered Nanomaterials.

The widespread industrial application of nanotechnology has increased the number of workers exposed to engineered nanomaterials (ENMs), but it is not clear to what extent prevention guidance is practiced. Our aim was to explore the extent that companies manufacturing and/or using ENMs apply risk assessment and management measures. Thirty-four companies were surveyed with an international 35-item questionnaire investigating company and workforce features, types of ENM handled, and risk evaluation and preventive measures adopted.