At least 129 workers killed in April

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At least 129 workers died in occupational homicides in April, according to the report released by the Health and Safety Labor Watch (İSİG).

The number of the workers killed in the first months of the year reached 479, with 120 workers killed in January, 109 in February and 121 in March.

Among the killed workers, 428 were wageworkers (workers and civil servants) and 51 were working on their own behalf.

Only 17 (3.54 percent) of the killed workers were union workers. They were working in the sectors of metal, chemistry, mining, municipality, transportation and healthcare.

Child workers

In the first four months, one child worker aged 14 and under and seven child/young workers aged 15-17 were killed.

Fifty-five workers were in the 18 and 27 age group, 246 were in the 28-50 age group, 108 were in the 51-64 age group, and 33 were aged 65 or over. The İSİG was not able to confirm the ages of 29 workers.

Thirty-three (7 percent) of the killed workers were women and 446 (93 percent) were men.

Twenty-six workers were refugees. Twelve of them were from Syria, four were from Uzbekistan, three were from Afghanistan, three were from Iran, and one was from Indonesia, Russia, Pakistan, Serbia, Turkmenistan and Ukraine each.

Ninety-three of the deaths were caused by traffic/shuttle accidents, 89 by crush/collapse, 67 by falling from a height, 63 by a heart attack or brain hemorrhage, 40 by Covid-19, 26 by suicide, 21 by poisoning/suffocation, 17 by explosion, 17 by electric shock, 17 by violence, 8 by being hit by an object. Nineteen workers were killed because of other reasons.

Over 80 construction workers were killed

The distribution of the occupational homicides by sectors in four months:

• Construction/road: 83
• Transportation: 61
• Agriculture and forestry: 57 (30 workers an 27 farmers)
• trade/office/education/cinema: 36
• Metal: 35
• Health and social services: 32
• Municipality and general work: 31
• Accommodation and entertainment: 22
• Mining: 9
• Defense and security: 16
• Energy: 15
• Petrochemistry, rubber: 13
• Textiles, leader: 12
• Ship, shipyard, marine, port: 9
• Wood and paper: 6
• Food and sweets: 4
• Press: 4
• Cement, glass: 3
• Sector could not be determined: 20

Cities

The highest number of deats were in İstanbul with 83. It was followed by Kocaeli (23), İzmir (20) and Bursa and Muğla (17). (HA/VK)