Protecting Safety and Health

When it comes to safety, we have a culture of active caring and a “count on me” attitude backed up by action. Year on year, we strive to improve safety at all our sites to benefit our colleagues and the communities in which we operate.

During fiscal 2007, we reduced employee recordable injuries by 18% and lost-time injuries by 9% versus the prior year. Our employee recordable injury rate was 0.79, and our lost-time injury rate was 0.22. We saw significant year-over-year improvement in the Americas, continued excellent performance in Asia and good performance in Europe. Our U.S. Healthcare business also delivered a 20% improvement in both recordable and lost-time injuries compared to the prior year. All regions delivered better-than-goal performance in preventable vehicle accident rates.

Contractor safety performance also improved significantly, with a 20% reduction in recordable injuries and 44% reduction in lost-time injuries versus the prior year.

Health and Safety (H&S) Training and Risk Assessments

We set H&S regulatory and our own specific training requirements for every employee in the company based on job function and risk exposures. Ranging from basic EH&S Management System awareness to more specific skills such as Confined Space Entry and Respiratory Protection, we build these requirements into each individual’s training profile and track them in a global database.

We also conduct and revalidate our Hazard and Risk Assessments at set intervals for a variety of disciplines, including Security Vulnerability Assessments (SVAs), Process Hazards Reviews, Health Hazard Assessments, and Corporate Assurance Audits. In addition to these formal activities, employees are accountable for controlling risks in their daily activities through safety work permits, job safety analysis, task safety observations and other measures.

Achieving Safety Standardization Certification in China Our Guangzhou, China facility was one of eight industry locations to achieve Safety Standardization certification by the Luogang Safety Bureau. Similar to OSH 18001 certification for occupational health and safety management systems, Safety Standardization certification is a new government requirement being implemented in several provinces. The site passed a comprehensive audit of its safety management systems to achieve this certification.