CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1       Background of the Study

Workers in construction sites face various occupational health hazards and must engage in some safety practices to avoid these hazards. Workers in construction sites are involved in fabrication, construction and installation activities where they are faced with various sources of hazards from chemical, physical, electrical, biological, to motion hazards etc.Workers in construction sites are at a high risk of burns related to chemical spill, molten iron spill, fire, gas explosion etc. According to World Health Organization (WHO) estimate in the year 2002, construction site accidents resulted in 16,000 burns and 66,000 chemical wounds.

Occupational health and safety of workers in construction sites is often threatened by risk relating to occupational exposure, limitations in supplied personal protective equipment and challenges from organizational support for safe practices. There are improved procedures to follow to prevent occupational exposures and for handling potentially harmful materials. These procedures are known as standard precautions or safety practices. Workers in construction sitesare to participate in regular Health and Safety Environment (HSE) courses.

Construction site accident can result to human injuries, damage to organization’s reputation, and financial consequences; this possibly lead to terrible human tragedies and substantial economic concernfrom legal cost, increased insurance premium, and damaged plants and equipment. Accidents in construction sites involve direct and indirect cost to a firm. The direct cost are those costs incurred as a direct result of an accident; including the costof transportation of the injured worker to the nearest medical facility, medical expenses,compensation paid to the injured worker, liability costs and damaged equipment and material cost. Indirect cost is any additional cost generated by the accident occurrence, for examplecost of investigations and cost of hiring a temporary replacement (Hinze and Applegate, 1991).

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