The Challenge and History of Safety - Essay Example

The issue of compensating workers was also put into consideration, a factor that encouraged researchers to study safety. Many organizations were found to motivate the research even further, in ensuring the safety of workers in industries. Some of them included: the American Standards Association, Crystal Eastman’s Work Accidents, and United Mine Workers. The era was marked by the perception that workers’ safety was necessary and that accidents at the workplace were mental.

Safety concerns in the agricultural sector, the steel industry, and several other manufacturing industries had outstanding records. Of these industries, the Steel one led the way with the ideas by Fredrick Taylor making major contributions to creating a safe environment for the management. Taylor developed a favorable interaction between management policies, various processes, and worker schedules (McGerr, 2010). In addition, the researchers in this period discovered that most accidents were psychologically made and that the only remedy was to create awareness and train individuals about the issue. However, the 1930s made it difficult for workers to sue those who violated the safety regulations due to the introduction of thoughts from the West. The Judiciary became stricter in ruling out cases since they would consider the level of fault from both sides of the coin; the workers and the company in question. Following such challenges, there was little evidence that the psychological way of looking at safety was convenient. It was also a hard task for researchers to convince people that science and investigation would precisely solve the issue, thus the occupational approach became less popular.

Energy Exchange Theory
The Energy exchange theory consists of ideas related to modern science. It developed a connection between human injury and the various forms of energy. According to this theory, the first set of injuries meddles with the whole body. The energy exchanges establish the environment in which people’s fears, personalities, and goals play out. For example, when one kidney fails, the activities of the entire body are interfered with, since energy is not equally distributed or some chemical functions are not in order. In the subsequent set, extreme forms of energy in the body may hinder proper functioning. From this example, it is logical to argue that electrical or heat energy charges can result in human injury. Hudson suggested that by developing procedures and policies, employees got protected, a suggestion that contributed so much to workplace safety management. His ideas were adopted by most engineers and experts in the quest to get guidelines on all issues surrounding accidents as well as preventive measures (Burke, 2006)

Accidents and Injuries Prevention
Accidents and injuries have for a long time been a public health challenge. The difference between their prevention strategies is in the aims, timing, and nature. As far as safety management is concerned, accident prevention is generally centered on the workplace and what causes the accidents. Contrary to this, injury prevention focuses on the people at a specified place of work. Accident prevention deals with the safety of the workers and the environment at work, while injury prevention looks at reducing the danger placed on workers by the various risks at the workplace. It is after an accident has occurred that injury prevention can be considered. Read More