Nearly three million workers die each year due to work-related accidents and diseases, an increase of more than 5 percent as compared to 2015, according to a recent estimate by the International Labour Organization (ILO).
Most of the fatalities — 2.6 million deaths — result from work-related diseases.
Accidents in the workplace account for an additional 330,000 deaths, according to ILO’s analysis.
The top three causes of work-related deaths were circulatory diseases, malignant neoplasms and respiratory diseases, contributing to more than three-quarters of total work-related mortality.
In addition, another 395 million workers globally sustained non-fatal work injuries, the data found.
The report, “A Call for Safer and Healthier Working Environments,” revealed that more men die from work-related incidents (51.4 per 100,000 working age adults) compared to women (17.2 per 100,000).
Asia and the Pacific region had the highest work-related mortality (63 percent of the global total) due to the size of the region’s workforce.
The report found that agriculture, construction, forestry and fishing, and manufacturing were the most hazardous sectors, with 200,000 fatal injuries per year, representing 63 percent of all fatal occupational injuries. One-in-three fatal occupational injuries worldwide occur among agricultural workers, the report found.