HSE Report into the Cost of Occupational Asthma

The Health and Safety Executive has published a report into the cost of occupational asthma in Great Britain. The HSE commissioned Metroeconomica Limited, 'the Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM), and the University of Aberdeen to develop detailed estimates of the cost of occupational asthma in Great Britain.

The report was commissioned in order to help to raise awareness among employers, workers, and policy-makers as to the potential gains to be realized from adopting measures to reduce the incidence of occupational asthma. In 2000 the Health and Safety Commission (WSC) published a long-term {10-year) occupational health strategy for Great Britain, setting an ambitious target for occupational asthma of a reduction of 30% in newly incident easts by 2010.

The report found:

• The 'average' worker suffering from occupational asthma is estimated to lose between 3, 5 and just over 4.5 work days per year. A worker with milder or mote severe occupational asthma is estimated to lose close to two and 10 work days per year respectively.


• The total number of newly reported cases of occupa¬tional asthma in Great Britain in 2003 was 631, of which 442 were male workers and 189 were female workers.


• The total lifetime costs to society of these new cases of occupational asthma are estimated to range from about £3.4mn to £4.8mn per year over the lifetime of the disease. If comparable numbers of new cases were diagnosed in 2004, 2005, 2006 and so on, this would give rise to additional streams of lifetime costs of similar magnitude.
  


• Allowing for the fact that the number of new cases of occupational asthma diagnosed in 2003 is under-reported by up to one-third,the total lifetime costs to society could be as high as ,£95.6mn to £133.5mn.
  


• The estimated total lifetime costs to society are made up of costs incurred by the individual, employers and the state ('taxpayers'). The largest cost burden falls on the individual worker (who incurs about 49% of total costs),followed very closely by- taxpayers (who incur about47% of total costs).In contrast, employers of workers diagnosed with occupational asthma in 2003 only incur about 4% of total costs.
  


• There appears,therefore, to be little incentive for employers to reduce the incidence of new cases of occupational asthma in Great Britain, despite the fact that significant benefits would accrue to the rest .of society: benefits to the state and employees could be as high as £69,7mn and £96.3mn over the lifetime of those workers diagnosed with the disease.