2023, a disastrous record year for deaths at work

The years go by. And the numbers are increasing, inexorably. For the second year in a row, the number of fatal work accidents exceeds levels never reached over recent years. Indeed, in its annual report on occupational risks and claims, the National Health Insurance Fund (CNAM) recorded 759 deaths following a work accident in 2023.

The publication of this report does not – it is a habit – make the front pages of the newspapers on this Christmas Eve where the social aspect only returns to the news to evoke the fear of a strike at the SNCF or among the parcel carriers. However, this very important figure represents a increase of 21 deaths compared to 2022 when 738 people died in a work accident.

Above all, this report reinforces a trend that the 2022 data had begun to outline. From year to year, the number of deaths at work increases. Indeed, we must put aside the data from 2020 and 2021 which, due to covid-19 and the partial shutdown of the economy, constitute non-representative years. But the figures for 2022 had already confirmed a strong increase observed in 2019.

At the time, the 2019 increase was attributed to a change in statistical methodology that better took into account the discomforts, without the consequences of this change being fully understood. quantifiable. « I spoke with statisticians from the CNAM who assured me that this change only partly explained this increase », assured last year, to political, Matthieu Lépine, author of The Invisible Slaughter, Investigation into workplace deaths.

Except that between 2019 and 2023, no major methodological change should be noted. And the increase continues, reaching figures never before reached in the 21st century in France. In detail, it is still discomfort which represents the main risk with 57% of deaths observed. A stable share compared to 2022. Road risk (12%) decreases slightly, as do suicides (4%). The rest, which are therefore “classic” work accidents (to use the terms of the CNAM), is the only part which increases slightly compared to 2022 (25%, +1 point).

Another one specificity of this report is obvious when reading it: the number of deaths at work continues to increase, while at the same time, the number of accidents at work continues to decrease. In 2023, the Fund recorded 100,000 fewer workplace accidents than in 2019 – even if at the same time it urges caution.

Stall

Indeed, in 2022, Health Insurance noticed that its historical series on professional risks were “stallling” and that this stall cannot “be explained by ‘natural’ favorable developments in claims”. In this new report, she does not explain this change, only noting that “the year 2023 confirms a break since the health crisis in previous statistical series”.

Same observation for days of temporary incapacity (TI) which are also significantly increasing. Their number exceeds 51 million, more than five million than in 2019! All this, while the employed population of the general system has increased by more than a million between these two time limits.

In other words, and even if we must be careful with the analysis of these data, everything suggests that the gravity accidents at work is increasingly important. Construction, transport and services (temporary work, health, cleaning, etc.) still remain the most deadly sectors of activity.

Sectors which combine widely recognized accident-causing factors: cascade subcontracting, lack of training, high speed, precarious status, extreme working conditions, etc. So many reasons which increase risks, without these major issues becoming a major public problem.

Finally, this figure of 759 deaths only includes employees of the general system. So the agricultural or civil service sectors are, for example, absent. Thus, this 35-year-old agricultural worker, who was crushed to death by his tractor in May 2023 in Gironde, is not one of the 759 deaths at work counted by the Fund.

Social phenomenon

Last year, Political had compiled the available data from the different regimes. This census showed that the increase in the general regime was not an exception, but rather a social phenomenon which transcended sectors of activity. In 2022, we recorded 903 deaths, a disastrous record in the 21st century.^e century. If, for 2023, the other regimes have not yet published their data, the significant increase in the general regime suggests a dramatic new record.

Published at the end of last week, this report has not yet attracted the attention of any mainstream media. Which nevertheless comes, once again, beat down the government discourse which, by pretexting “formidable stability” – says Olivier Dussopt in 2023 –, is disinterested in this subject which very often affects the most precarious in our society.

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