More than one in 10 of work-related deaths in Canada in 2020 happened in B.C., says a new University of Regina statistical report.
Researchers Dr. Sean Tucker and Anya Keefe found that there were 694 deaths nationally, 88 happened in B.C.
That’s 12.7 percent while the province accounted for 13.5 percent of Canada’s population that year.
Northwest Territories and Nunavut had the highest five-year average injury fatality rate at 7.1 deaths per 100,000 people.
Among provinces with over 100,000 workers, Saskatchewan’s five-year average injury fatality rate ranks highest at 4.4 per 100,000, followed by Alberta at 4.1 per 100,000.
Among provinces with over 100,000 workers, Newfoundland and Labrador had the highest five-year average occupational disease fatality rate at nine deaths per 100,000, followed by Ontario with 4.4 deaths per 100,000 and then Alberta at 4.3 deaths per 100,000.
B.C. was among nine provinces where that rate increased over previous years.
Tucker and Keefe’s comparison of the 2017-2019 average rates with 2020 rates showed that among provinces with over 100,000 workers, Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta had the greatest increases at 18 per cent, 17 per cent and 11 per cent, respectively.
Among provinces with over 100,000 workers, Manitoba continued to have the highest five-year lost-time injury rate at 2.67 per cent, followed by British Columbia with 2.18 per cent and Saskatchewan 2.02 per cent.
Researchers cautioned that many situations go unreported to workplace regulators.
“A recent study of workers in British Columbia found that 53.7 per cent of workers who had experienced a work-related injury that resulted in two or more days off work did not report their injury to WorkSafeBC,” Tucker and Keefe noted.
In terms of the 2020 workplace impacts of COVID-19, there were approximately 32,742 accepted injury claims and at least 39 fatality claims for work-related exposures to COVID-19 nationally.
In 2021, those claims increased to at least 55,535. There were also at least 138 accepted COVID-19 fatality claims.
There were 1,189 accepted COVID-19 injury claims in B.C., a figure that more than doubled in 2021 to 3,465.
With COVID deaths, though, the number went from one in 2020 to 13 in 2021.
