The members of the EU Mental Health Alliance for Work and Employment (EU MH Alliance) have issued a joint statement on the public consultation on EU Strategic Framework on Health and Safety at Work to stress the importance of psychosocial factors in occupational safety and health.
As the consultation primarily focuses on the evaluation and impact on the Strategic Framework on Health and Safety at Work 2014-2020, the EU MH Alliance would like to take the opportunity to highlight that such a Framework largely overlooked psychosocial factor.
In the past years, psychosocial risks and work-related stress have increasingly become a reality in many workplaces. The syndemic nature of COVID-19 additionally unveiled the importance of good mental health and wellbeing at work as fundamental to ensure quality of life for every worker and their family. Indeed, the mental health toll the health crisis evoked is exponential. Any recovery and resilience building plan, including in the economic sphere, must realise that good mental health and the prevention of work-related stress have a positive and preventative/buffering impact on the economic outcomes of individuals, companies,
communities and society as a whole.
Only if the European Commission firmly places psychosocial aspects of work at the heart of the new EU OSH Framework for the years to come, workers across Europe will benefit from real and tangible benefits.
The European Alliance for Mental Health - Employment & Work 