Last Year, Laboratory Accidents Increased... Three Serious Accidents Reported

2020 Laboratory Safety Management Survey Results
Continuous Improvement of Laboratory Safety Laws and Regulations

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[Asia Economy Reporter Junho Hwang] Last year, a total of 232 laboratory accidents occurred at 117 research institutions. This represents an increase of 22 cases compared to the previous year, with three serious accidents also reported.

The Ministry of Science and ICT announced the results of the 2020 Laboratory Safety Management Survey on the 31st, which included this information. According to the survey, accidents occurring within laboratories increased compared to the previous year. Laboratory accidents refer to incidents causing bodily injury or harm requiring treatment for three or more days. The main causes were mostly failure to wear protective equipment (30.2%), non-compliance with safety rules (15.9%), and poor inspection, maintenance, or preservation of research equipment.

Among the 456 target institutions, 438 (96.1%) designated laboratory safety environment managers. However, only 680 (32.6%) of the total 2,089 managers were dedicated solely to laboratory safety tasks. The number of institutions that designated laboratory supervisors was counted as 3,853 institutions out of 4,035 target institutions, covering 80,938 laboratories out of 81,346 laboratories. Regarding health checkups, among 59,548 research personnel at 485 target institutions, 470 institutions (96.9%) had 51,364 research personnel (86.3%) undergo health examinations. Accident insurance maintained a 100% subscription rate for the fourth consecutive year.

The Ministry of Science and ICT stated that to prevent laboratory accidents, it will strengthen the responsibilities of laboratory supervisors according to the full revision of the 'Laboratory Safety Act' (including provision of protective equipment, education, and health checkups). This year's survey was conducted over eight months (April to November 2020) targeting 4,155 institutions nationwide.

Meanwhile, there were a total of 4,035 universities (338), research institutions (176), and corporate-affiliated research institutes (3,521) operating science and technology laboratories with 10 or more research personnel. This number has been decreasing over the past five years. The total number of laboratories was 81,346, of which 48,586 (59.7%) were high-risk laboratories requiring focused management. The total number of research personnel was 1,322,814, with university students (undergraduate level) as research beginners accounting for the highest proportion at 884,094 (66.8%). The number of research personnel has shown an increasing trend every year.

Kang Sangwook, Director of the Future Talent Policy Bureau at the Ministry of Science and ICT, said, "We are doing our best to cooperate with the National Assembly and related ministries to ensure the passage of the amendment to the Industrial Accident Compensation Insurance Act (proposed by Assembly members Jeon Hyesook and Kang Eunmi), which was raised due to the issue of treatment cost limits following the accident at Kyungpook National University last year."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.