In 2022, the number of fatal accidents per 100 000 employed people ranged from fewer than 1.00 in the Netherlands, Greece, Germany, Sweden and Ireland to more than 3.00 fatal accidents per 100 000 employed people in Bulgaria, France and Malta.
Latvia narrowly avoided joining the 3.00 club by recording 2.9 fatalities per 100 000 employed persons. Some relatively good news was that the number of fatal accidents at work in Latvia fell from 38 in 2021 to 29 in 2022.
The highest incidence rate among EU countries was recorded in Malta, with 5.28 fatal accidents per 100 000 employed people.
Curiously, despite being way over the EU average for fatal accidents, Latvia is way under the EU average for non-fatal accidents at work.
Across the EU, there were 1 506 non-fatal accidents per 100 000 employed people in 2022. The range for incidence rates among EU countries was from fewer than 100 non-fatal accidents per 100 000 employed people in Romania and Bulgaria to more than 2 000 per 100 000 employed people in Spain, Portugal, France and Denmark.
"Particularly low incidence rates for non-fatal accidents may reflect an under-reporting issue, for example, linked to poorly established reporting systems, little financial incentive for victims to report such accidents or non-binding legal obligations for employers. In the same way, well-established reporting/recognition systems may often explain the high incidence rate in some countries. While the phenomenon of low non-fatal incidence rates can in part be considered to reflect under-reporting, the situation for incidence rates of fatal accidents is different as it is much more difficult to avoid reporting a fatal accident," explained Eurostat.
