http://www.hhs.gov HHS Issues First Comprehensive Survey of Working Women's Health For Immediate Release Contact: Sandra
Smith, NCHS Press Office (301) 458-4800 Series 3, No. 31. Women: Work and Health. 104 pp. (PHS) 98-1415. GPO stock
number and price forthcoming The Department of Health and Human Services today announced the release of the first comprehensive report on the health and well-being of America's working women. "Women: Work and Health" profiles key statistics for the more than 60 million women who are part of the American labor force, using data from the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Commerce. "For the first time from any source, this report compiles the wide-ranging national data that are the most critical for assessing the complex relationship between employment and women's health in our society," said HHS Secretary Donna E. Shalala. "At a time when more women are in the U.S. labor force than ever before, these statistics provide an important baseline for learning more about the needs of working women and opportunities to improve their health." Since 1950 the labor force participation rate has increased at least 170 percent, so that today more than one-half of adult women work. During that period, women as a proportion of the labor force doubled from 1 in 4 to nearly one-half of today's workers. This report describes the sociodemographics, household characteristics, and health of women according to workforce status and job conditions, with comparative data for men. Highlights of the
report For both women and men, job-related injuries most frequently affected the back. Among the 9 million working women who had back pain, about one-third attributed their back pain to work-related activities or injuries. More than half of the women employed in service or blue collar occupations and almost half of the working black women attributed their back pain to work. Regarding health
education in the workplace "While the report does not present information on causal factors which could explain the patterns in the data, it does provide a comprehensive, time-saving resource for additional studies to explain the patterns in such specific areas as workplace safety and health, health insurance, health promotion, and other key issues," said NCHS Director Edward J. Sondik, Ph.D. "This report provides essential data for government, labor, industry, and the health community as we work together to develop forward-looking research for the coming decade on the factors that put women uniquely at risk for injury and illness on the job," said NIOSH Director Linda Rosenstock, M.D., M.P.H. Copies of the report are available on the NCHS home page at http://www.cdc.gov/nchswww and from NIOSH by calling the NIOSH toll-free information number, 1-800-35-NIOSH (1-800-356-4674). NOTE: HHS press releases are available on the World Wide Web.
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May 04, 2004
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