Christel | Passionate About SHEQ Management

OHSAS 18001 revised (I)

• September 13th, 2007

The Occupational Health & Safety Assessment Series 18001 has been upgraded from the 1999 version to the 2007 version and has been made available since beginning of August this year.

It is interesting to note that OHSAS 18001 now refers to itself as a standard, not a specification, or document, as in the earlier edition. This reflects the increasing adoption of OHSAS 18001 as the basis for national standards on occupational health and safety management systems.

The reader of the new OHSAS 18001:2007 will also note the significant improvement in alignment with ISO 14001:2004 throughout the standard, and improved compatibility with ISO 9001:2000.

In the main, it seems that the changes in this document which may impact on your existing OHSAS18001: 1999 management system can be grouped as follows:

1. Changes to the definitions of terms used in the standard, which I will cover in this article, and
2. Changes to the clauses, which will be addressed in a second article.

Changes to the definitions of terms used in the standard document that might impact your current Occupational Health & Safety Management System

So let us look at the changes, new definitions have been added, and existing definitions revised:

ACCEPTABLE RISK

The term “tolerable risk” has been replaced by the term “acceptable risk” (see 3.1)

INCIDENT

The term “accident” is no longer referenced, and has been included in the term “incident” (see 3.9)

HAZARD

The definition of the term “hazard” no longer refers to “damage to property or damage to the workplace environment” (see 3.6) and the definition of “hazard” has been changed to include “ Source, situation, or act with a potential for harm in terms of human injury or ill health (3.8), or a combination of these.”

ILL HEALTH

New inclusion of “ill health”: identifiable, adverse physical or mental condition arising from and /or made worse by a work activity and/or work-related situation.

INCIDENT

The definition of “Incident” changes to: event(s) in which a work-related injury or ill health (3.8) (regardless of severity) or fatality occurred or could have occurred.

NOTE An event where no death, ill health, or injury occurs may also be referred to as a “near-miss”, “near-hit”, “close call” or “dangerous occurrence”.

RISK

The definition of “risk” changes to include: combination of the likelihood of an occurrence of a hazardous event or exposure(s) and the severity of injury or ill health (3.8) that may be caused by the event or exposure(s).

RISK ASSESSMENT

The definition if “risk assessment” changes to: process of evaluating the risk (3.22), taking into account the adequacy of any existing controls, and deciding whether or not the risk is acceptable

In the next article we will take a closer look at the changes that were made to the clauses of the new OHSAS 18001:2007.

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One Response to “OHSAS 18001 revised (I)”

1. OHSAS 18001 revised (II) | Christel | Passionate About SHEQ Management Says:
   December 11th, 2008 at 3:19 pm

   [...] “changes or proposed changes in the organization or its activities”; “modifications to the OH&S management system, including temporary changes, and their impacts on operations, processes, and activities” and [...]