Occupational health

Occupational health is an area of work in public health to promote and maintain highest degree of physical, mental and social well-being of workers in all occupations.

Its objectives are:

1. the maintenance and promotion of workers' health and working capacity;
2. the improvement of working conditions and the working environment to become conducive to safety and health;
3. the development of work organization and working cultures that should reflect essential value systems adopted by the undertaking concerned, and include effective managerial systems, personnel policy, principles for participation, and voluntary quality-related management practices to improve occupational safety and health.

The science and practice of occupational health involves several disciplines, such as occupational medicine, nursing, ergonomics, psychology, hygiene, safety and other.

The World Health Assembly urges countries to

• develop national policies and action plans and to build institutional capacities on occupational health,
• scale up the coverage with essential interventions for prevention and control of occupational and work-related diseases and injuries and occupational health services
• ensure in collaboration with other relevant national health programmes such as those dealing with communicable and non-communicable diseases, prevention of injuries, health promotion, mental health, environmental health, and health systems development.