Excerpt from the OH&S Canada magazine
With a heat wave hitting the prairies, an official with the Manitoba Workers Compensation Board says employers should have a plan in place to protect people on the job. Warren Preece of the WCB says hot weather is as much a hazard in the workplace as an unguarded saw or working on a roof without fall protection. He says high heat can cause exhaustion, dizziness and even seizures in some instances.
The first thing every employer needs to understand is that there is, without question, a legal duty to safeguard workers against the risks of heat stress. Seven provinces/territories (BC, NB, NL, PE, QC, SK and YT) include in their OHS regulations specific measures that employers must take to protect workers against heat stress. For example, Part 7 of the B.C. OHS Regulation requires employers to:
– Limit workers’ exposure to excessive heat;
– Conduct heat stress assessments to determine workers’ risks of hazardous exposure;
– Put into place a heat stress exposure control plan; and
– Implement engineering and administrative controls.https://hrsgroup.com/blog/heat-stress-the-law/