MANCHESTER, OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY & HEALTH (OSH)

Today, The Stones have received the wonderful visit of one of their closest friends, DR.

DR is an expert in Occupational Safety and Health and has accompanied the family while they have been visiting some of the current examples of the industrial golden past of the city of Manchester.

Manchester was very important during the Industrial Revolution thanks to its cotton production. Working two centuries ago was much more dangerous than now but this does not mean that we must notprotect ourselves and take care of us when we are working.

Manchester was a pioneer city in occupational safety and health especially after the Factory Acts of the early nineteenth century (from 1802 onwards) arose out of concerns about the poor health of children working in cotton mills: the Act of 1833 created a dedicated professional Factory Inspectorate.

The Stones have discovered these and other events and they have learnt lots of things about the importance of occupational safety and health.

While they were visiting these factories, The Grandma was doing business. She is preparing a great surprise for the family.

More information: Medium

Occupational Safety and Health (OSH), also commonly referred to as Health and Safety, Occupational Health and Safety (OHS), Occupational Health, or Occupational Safety, is a multidisciplinary field concerned with the safety, health, and welfare of people at work.

The goal of an occupational safety and health program is to foster a safe and healthy work environment.

OSH may also protect co-workers, family members, employers, customers, and many others who might be affected by the workplace environment.

In common-law jurisdictions, employers have a common law duty to take reasonable care of the safety of their employees. Statute law may, in addition, impose other general duties, introduce specific duties, and create government bodies with powers to regulate workplace safety issues: details of this vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.

The research and regulation of Occupational Safety and Health are a relatively recent phenomenon. As labor movements arose in response to worker concerns in the wake of the Industrial Revolution, worker's health entered consideration as a labor-related issue.

In the United Kingdom, the Factory Acts of the early nineteenth century (from 1802 onwards) arose out of concerns about the poor health of children working in cotton mills: the Act of 1833 created a dedicated professional Factory Inspectorate.

The initial remit of the Inspectorate was to police restrictions on the working hours in the textile industry of children and young persons, introduced to prevent chronic overwork, identified as leading directly to ill-health and deformation, and indirectly to a high accident rate.

However, on the urging of the Factory Inspectorate, a further Act in 1844 giving similar restrictions on working hours for women in the textile industry introduced a requirement for machinery guarding but only in the textile industry, and only in areas that might be accessed by women or children.

In 1840 a Royal Commission published its findings on the state of conditions for the workers of the mining industry that documented the appallingly dangerous environment that they had to work in and the high frequency of accidents. The commission sparked public outrage which resulted in the Mines Act of 1842. The act set up an inspectorate for mines and collieries which resulted in many prosecutions and safety improvements, and by 1850, inspectors were able to enter and inspect premises at their discretion.

Otto von Bismarck inaugurated the first social insurance legislation in 1883 and the first worker's compensation law in 1884, the first of their kind in the Western world. Similar acts followed in other countries, partly in response to labor unrest.

More information: US Department of Labor

A hazard is an agent which has the potential to cause harm to a vulnerable target.

Hazards can be both natural or human induced. Sometimes natural hazards such as floods and drought can be caused by human activity. Floods can be caused by bad drainage facilities and droughts can be caused by over-irrigation or groundwater pollution.

The terms hazard and risk are often used interchangeably however, in terms of risk assessment, they are two very distinct terms. A hazard is any agent that can cause harm or damage to humans, property, or the environment.

Risk is defined as the probability that exposure to a hazard will lead to a negative consequence, or more simply, a hazard poses no risk if there is no exposure to that hazard.

Hazards can be dormant or potential, with only a theoretical probability of harm. An event that is caused by interaction with a hazard is called an incident. The likely severity of the undesirable consequences of an incident associated with a hazard, combined with the probability of this occurring, constitute the associated risk. If there is no possibility of a hazard contributing towards an incident, there is no risk.

Hazards can be classified in several ways. One of these ways is by specifying the origin of the hazard.

 

One key concept in identifying a hazard is the presence of stored energy that, when released, can cause damage. Stored energy can occur in many forms: chemical, mechanical, thermal, radioactive or electrical. 

Another class of hazard does not involve release of stored energy, rather it involves the presence of hazardous situations. Examples include confined or limited egress spaces, oxygen-depleted atmospheres, awkward positions, repetitive motions, low-hanging or protruding objects.

Hazards may also be classified as natural, anthropogenic, or technological. They may also be classified as health or safety hazards, by the populations that may be affected, and the severity of the associated risk. In most cases a hazard may affect a range of targets, and have little or no effect on others.

 More information: High Speed Training

Identification of hazards assumes that the potential targets are defined, and is the first step in performing a risk assessment.

Hazards may be grouped according to their characteristics. These factors are related to geophysical events which are not process specific:

-Areal extent of damage zone

-Intensity of impact at a point

-Duration of impact at a point

-Rate of onset of the event

-Predictability of the event

The terms hazard and risk are often used interchangeably. However, in terms of risk assessment, these are two very distinct terms. A hazard is an agent that can cause harm or damage to humans, property, or the environment. Risk is the probability that exposure to a hazard will lead to a negative consequence, or more simply, a hazard poses no risk if there is no exposure to that hazard.

Risk can be defined as the likelihood or probability of a given hazard of a given level causing a particular level of loss of damage.

The elements of risk are populations, communities, the built environment, the natural environment, economic activities and services which are under threat of disaster in a given area.

 More information: HSA

The total risk according to UNDRO 1982 is the sum of predictable deaths, injuries, destruction, damage, disruption, and costs of repair and mitigation caused by a disaster of a particular level in a given area or areas.

Another definition of risk is the probable frequency and probable magnitude of future losses. This definition also focuses on the probability of future loss whereby degree of vulnerability to hazard represents the level of risk on a particular population or environment. The threats posed by a hazard are:

-Hazards to people – death, injury, disease and stress

-Hazards to goods – property damage and economic loss

-Hazards to environment – loss of flora and fauna, pollution and loss of amenity

After listening to DR's explanations, The Stones have prepared their next visit. Tonight, they are going to travel to Wolverhampton to watch the match between the local team, Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club and Manchester City in the Molineux Stadium in Wolverhampton, Staffordshire. They have been invited by Pep Guardiola and they are very happy, especially Yolanda Stone.

Download Ocuppational Health and Safety-Tool Kit for Small Business

 Risk analysis can cater to any sort of hazard, but their profession owes its existence to a relatively narrow band of possible dangers.

Ian Hacking

MANCHESTER, COTTON PROCESSING & MANUFACTURING

MANCHESTER is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England.

It has a population of 547,627 as of 2018. It lies within the United Kingdom's second-most populous urban area, with a population of 2.5 million and third-most populous metropolitan area, with a population of 3.3 million.

It is fringed by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and an arc of towns with which it forms a continuous conurbation. The local authority for the city is Manchester City Council.

The recorded history of Manchester began with the civilian settlement associated with the Roman fort of Mamucium or Mancunium, which was established in about AD 79 on a sandstone bluff near the confluence of the rivers Medlock and Irwell. Although historically and traditionally a part of Lancashire, areas of Cheshire south of the River Mersey were incorporated into Manchester in the 20th century.

The city is notable for its architecture, culture, musical exports, media links, scientific and engineering output, social impact, sports clubs and transport connections.

Manchester is a city of notable firsts. Manchester Liverpool Road railway station was the world's first inter-city passenger railway station and the oldest remaining railway station.

The city has also excelled in scientific and engineering advancement, as it was at The University of Manchester, in 1917, that scientist Ernest Rutherford first split the atom. The university's further achievements include Frederic C. Williams, Tom Kilburn and Geoff Tootill who developed and built the world's first stored-program computer in 1948; and, in 2004, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov successfully isolated and characterised the first graphene.

More information: Manchester City Council

The name Manchester originates from the Latin name Mamucium or its variant Mancunio and the citizens are still referred to as Mancunians. These names are generally thought to represent a Latinisation of an original Brittonic name.

Manchester's history is concerned with textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution.

The great majority of cotton spinning took place in the towns of south Lancashire and north Cheshire, and Manchester was for a time the most productive centre of cotton processing.

Manchester became known as the world's largest marketplace for cotton goods and was dubbed Cottonopolis and Warehouse City during the Victorian era.

In Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, the term manchester is still used for household linen: sheets, pillow cases or towels. The industrial revolution brought about huge change in Manchester and was key to the increase in Manchester's population.

Manchester began expanding at an astonishing rate around the turn of the 19th century as people flocked to the city for work from Scotland, Wales, Ireland and other areas of England as part of a process of unplanned urbanisation brought on by the Industrial Revolution. It developed a wide range of industries, so that by 1835 Manchester was without challenge the first and greatest industrial city in the world.

Engineering firms initially made machines for the cotton trade, but diversified into general manufacture. Similarly, the chemical industry started by producing bleaches and dyes, but expanded into other areas. Commerce was supported by financial service industries such as banking and insurance.

More information: The University of Manchester

The Stones have started their long trip flying from Barcelona to Manchester, the first stop. They have left the El Prat Barcelona Airport this afternoon and they have just arrived to Manchester.

The Grandma has rented an enormous mansion to spend these days. She is afraid with the current COVID situation and she trusts more in a private residence than in a hotel.

The family has arrived to the mansion with enough time to leave their baggage and go out to have dinner in one of the most popular places of the city. They have been preparing this trip carefully and they want to enjoy this amazing city, MANCHESTER.

 More information: Visit Manchester

What Manchester does today, the world does tomorrow.

Roy Walters