Occupational safety and health in Europe - state and trends 2023 
European Agency for Safety and Health at Work – EU-OSHA 58 
The rate for fatal accidents was much lower for young workers; in 2019 it stood at 1.28 for workers under 
25, compared to 1.86 for workers between 25 and 54 years. 
The main reason for this difference is a high employment rate of young workers in sectors that are more 
prone to accidents than others, that is, wholesale and trade and hotels and restaurants. Moreover, they 
have a much higher rate of precarious types of employment, particularly temporary contracts, that is, 
they are often less trained and less experienced regarding risks at the workplace.  
Often one, two or more of these characterisations add to each other, that is, migrant, low -skilled and 
woman. The table below is one example of such ‘crossovers’. 
 
Table 13: Crossovers of health and safety risks among groups of workers (2010) – DG for Internal 
policies, policy department111 
 
In general, a weak position in the labour market bears the risk of a low level of safety and health 
measures. Safety and health risks due to individual characteristics might also be underestimated if the 
mainstream of OSH measures is designed and implemented for the dominant group in an enterprise or 
sector. In many enterprises awareness and knowledge of  OSH is focused on the core business while 
other groups are regarded as auxiliary, for example, cleaning, canteen  and drivers, also low -skilled 
clerical workers might experience a missing awareness for ‘minority issues’ in production- dominated 
enterprises. It can also be the other way around for manual workers who work in highly administratively 
dominated enterprises.