Evidence map›Paper›PMID 32954421›Full record

ArticleOccupational medicine (Oxford, England)2020

Covid-19: statutory means of scrutinizing workers' deaths and disease.

R M Agius

Open access · bronzeAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Occupational medicine (Oxford, England), 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
3citing papers in PubMed
0.8field-weighted citation impact, top 24% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

3 citing papers in PubMed, 7 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Continuity or Change: Occupational Health Policies of Key Organizations in Great Britain After the Major COVID Waves 2020-2022.New solutions : a journal of environmental and occupational health policy : NS · 2026
    Article
  2. Article
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.

R M AgiusEmeritus Professor of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, The University of Manchester, Manchester, UK.
University of Manchester · GB

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundBy law, covid-19 disease and deaths in workers may lead to coroners' inquests and/or Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigations.

aimsThis study assesses the adequacy of these statutory means to yield recommendations for prevention of acquiring covid-19 infection from work.

methodsCovid-19 guidance from the chief coroner and the HSE was appraised, including using Office for National Statistics (ONS) data. Practitioners were asked to estimate the likelihood that covid-19 disease may have arisen from 'near-miss' scenarios. Data from the judiciary and the HSE were analysed.

resultsThe coroners' guidance allowed a wider range of reports of death than did the HSE and conformed better with ONS data on covid-19 mortality by occupation. In the practitioner survey, 62 respondents considered a higher likelihood that reported covid-19 cases would have arisen from the scenario deemed unreportable as a 'dangerous occurrence' by HSE than the reportable scenario (P < 0.001). On average there was only one coroner's report to prevent future death from occupational disease every year in England and Wales. The HSE dealt with a yearly average of 1611 reports of work-related disease including 104 on biological agents, but has received about 9000 covid-19 reports.

conclusionsCurrent HSE guidance for reporting work-related covid-19 may miss many thousands of cases and needs further iteration. Coroners have very limited experience of inquiry into occupational disease caused by biological agents compared with the HSE. Concerns regarding national policy such as on protective equipment warrant a full public inquiry.

Indexed as

BetacoronavirusCause of DeathOccupational HealthCoronavirus InfectionsCoroners and Medical ExaminersCOVID-19Disease NotificationHumansOccupational DiseasesOccupational ExposurePandemicsPneumonia, ViralSARS-CoV-2United KingdomCoronersdeathHSEoccupational diseasesoccupational healthRIDDOR

Identifiers

PMID32954421
PMCPMC7543539
OpenAlexW3087602508

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.