Occupational safety and health in Europe - state and trends 2023 
European Agency for Safety and Health at Work – EU-OSHA 14 
Safer and healthier technologies and organisation 
To support the practical implementation of preventive safety and health measures , numerous 
actors (e.g. organisations of OSH professionals and practitioners, and standardi sation institutes such 
as the European Committee for Standardisation and the International Organisation for Standardisation) 
issued safety and health guidance or standards, or develo ped new and advanced OSH management 
systems, the engineering sciences worked on better technical preventive technologies, on measuring 
and monitoring technologies, the medical sciences introduced better medical diagnosis and treatment 
of work-related diseases, and the social sciences contributed with better knowledge on the legal and 
economic determinants of OSH, or analysed the characteristics of awareness raising, knowledge 
development and healthy work organisation.  
It is obvious that better technical and organisational prevention at work  contributed to more safety 
and the evident strong reduction in accidents. Prominent fields and examples of such improvements 
are: technically safer design of moving vehicles (e.g. for fork lifts or heavy trucks and machines, light 
and noise warning signals for moving vehicles); safer design of machines like automatic shut downs or 
disconnections, two-hand operating of machines (e.g. for pressing and punching), safer cranes including 
better technologies for communication between co- workers, coverage of moving parts, safer company 
cars (e.g. safety belts and airbags), safer tools (e.g. for drilling or cutting); improved personal protective 
equipment like air-supplied breathing apparatus, steel mesh gloves for meat workers, trousers for forest 
workers that resist a chainsaw; minimum safety requirements for buildings (e.g. forms and size of stairs 
and handrails, fire exits and fire alarms, safer ladders and scaffolds), emer gency equipment like eye 
wash and emergency showers; better monitoring of acute hazards (e.g. in sewage water systems), 
exhaust and ventilation technologies to avoid fumes, dusts, chemicals or contact with hazardous 
biological agents; strong safety obligations for work in confined spaces, or for work at height and work 
in trenches; introduction of explosion zones and of non- sparking tools, a  comprehensive system of 
warning signals, warning signals for slippery floors and unsafe grounds, better warning systems and 
equipment in particularly dangerous work environments like road maintenance, combined with better 
organisational measures; quality systems that promote continuous repair and maintenance of tools; 
regular instructions by safety representatives and safety coordinators, and guarantee of minimum safety 
standards of machines and products by European standards like CE (‘European Conformity’).  
Major technological developments 
The widespread introduction of new or advanced technologies  — automation, digitalisation/ICT, 
green technologies, new material technologies and so on — results in substantial changes in work 
organisation and work processes, and replacement of (traditional) materials (screws by glues, metal and 
wood by plastics, nanomaterials). For OSH regulators and practitioners, it is a constant challenge to 
assess these changes regarding their impact on risks for health and safety and to develop adequate 
risk prevention and mitigation measures.  
Foresight studies (e.g. by EU-OSHA) have shown that such technological change can help improve 
working conditions, for example, by taking over heavy, dangerous or routine work (automation, 
robotisation, exoskeletons), or by bet ter communication and remote control via ICT tools. At the same 
time, they can also pose new risks, creating rigid work processes without much decision latitude, along