Workplace deaths, injuries down in Saskatchewan for 2013

REGINA – Workplace injuries and deaths were down in Saskatchewan during 2013, but the numbers still don’t paint a rosy picture.

The Worker’s Compensation Board (WCB) tabled its annual report Tuesday, reporting 35 workplace fatalities last year among 31,000 injury claims.

Both those numbers are a significant improvement over 2012, when there were 60 workplace deaths and nearly 33,000 injury claims.

However, Saskatchewan still has the second highest rate of time-loss claims in Canada.

WCB officials say the focus will continue to be on injury prevention.

“The best way to mitigate losses is to just not have injury occur in the first place,” said WCB CEO Peter Federko.

“While we’ve seen I think, tremendous success, we’re still sitting well behind the national average at 2.54 per cent, so we will continue to make that our focus.”

Federko also said there continues to be behavioural and attitude issues in Saskatchewan regarding workplace injuries.