In Chile, over 300,000 people currently work as deliverers for digital platforms, known as deliverys or riders. This new way of working poses new challenges related to the protection of this group of workers, as they generally operate in precarious conditions and the level of occupational risk they are exposed to is quite high.

The pandemic that recently hit the entire world has changed our ways of working, generating a significant negative impact on people’s health in both the world of work and everyday life. Added to this are the economic difficulties that countries are currently experiencing worldwide.

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed an enormous challenge for health systems, particularly with regard to the expansion of healthcare capacity, with a focus on beds in intensive care units (ICUs) and the mechanical ventilators required to equip them.

To cope with this problem, the Mutual for Safety CChC and the TECCAP-TPI Engineering Consortium formed an alliance to develop emergency mechanical ventilators designed, manufactured and validated at the national level.

Preventive management at work establishes the aim of protecting workers, based on the Occupational Accidents and Diseases Act (Act 16.744 of 1968).

Today, around the world, we are dealing with a COVID-19 pandemic. Many countries are affected, including Chile, with great problems keeping people, including workers, safe and maintaining continuity of operations for businesses.

To contribute to preventing and reducing serious and fatal accidents, Mutual for Safety CChC (Mutual de Seguridad CChC) in Chile has focussed on adapting training to the real situation of workers, seeking methodologies orientated towards adult learning.

Silicosis is an incurable lung disease caused by inhaling dust containing free crystalline silica. Silica is a chemical compound found in crystalline and amorphous (non-crystalline) forms.

The Occupational Exposure to Silica in Chile (Situación de Exposición Laboral a Sílice en Chile) report (Ministry of Health, 2015) estimated that 5.4 per cent of the workforce is at high risk of exposure to silica.

Chile’s Mutual for Safety CChC (Mutual de Seguridad CChC) has formed a multidisciplinary team to develop and implement a care model for its patients with sequelae. Tailored to the needs of chronically ill patients, the model allows appropriate monitoring of related risks with a view to preventing bio-psychosocial complications that can affect how such patients maintain their residual capacity in the long term.

The good practice refers to a manual that brings together Chilean Safety Association (Asociación Chilena de Seguridad – ACHS) methodology and experience in the implementation of effective health promotion strategies.

The manual systematically describes all the phases, activities, considerations and tools involved for the effective implementation of a workplace health promotion strategy.

The manual makes it possible to share the most effective method of workplace health promotion with other workplaces, organizations and countries. 

Since 2014, a cash benefit allowance is paid to millions of recipients in the month of March of every year to the most needy people and families. This benefit is called the “March Permanent Family Benefit” (Aporte Familiar Permanente Marzo – AFPM) which consolidates through the use of better technology the payment of various extraordinary allowances dating back to 2009 by standardizing the process, setting the selection criteria for beneficiaries, and issuing beneficiaries’ lists.

Good Practice: Tools for the Innovation of Health Promotion in the Workplace: Programme “Por un Buen Trabajo” (For a Healthy Job).

This programme, developed by the Department of Preventive Health of the Chilean Safety Association (Asociación Chilena de Seguridad (ACHS)), is intended as a specific methodological tool to develop management skills in the area of health promotion in the workplace. Its general objective is to develop effective strategies in health promotion with a long-term perspective.

For the past nine years, the Mutual for Safety CChC (Mutual de Seguridad CChC) has been showing its social commitment to Chile’s development through the implementation a model of systematic attention and intervention to deal with occupational risks, aimed at looking after the health and safety of workers in micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Historically, these businesses have had to deal with problems related to their own survival, without access to prevention resources allowing them to achieve a sustained reduction in their accident indicators.

Chile’s Mutual for Safety CChC (Mutual de Seguridad CChC), in its role as administrator of Law No. 16,744 on work accidents and occupational diseases, has for more than 15 years had a process in place to promote and facilitate workers’ return to work. It has helped to generate rehabilitation processes through its holistic approach to health, with a focus on providing social protection and social security coverage to Chile’s workforce.

Occupational accidents resulting in disability constitute a complex and multidimensional problem whose resolution transcends what is strictly provided for in the occupational accidents and diseases law (Law 16.744 of 1968). This problem impacts on the life opportunities of the affected people and results in vulnerabilities affecting not only them but also the institutions involved and society as a whole.

The social security system in Chile grants workers the right to take leave or to reduce their working day hours when faced with a disease that creates temporary disability. This right is materialized in an instrument called “medical leave”. Formal proceedings to obtain this leave must be carried out in person, filling in paper forms. These proceeding can be cumbersome and inefficient.