US DOL Launches ‘Beat the Heat’ Contest

OSHA has launched a nationwide contest to encourage employers to pay attention to heat-related dangers in the workplace. 

The “Beat the Heat” contest calls for employers to share their best tools and resources for informing workers about the dangers of heat exposure in indoor and outdoor workplaces. 

Reducing the number of heat related illnesses has become one of OSHA’s major initiatives over the past year. 

Growing Concern

Heat stress killed 815 U.S. workers and seriously injured more than 70,000 between 1992 and 2017, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Each year thousands of workers are hospitalized or suffer illnesses due to heat related factors. This is especially true for new workers due to a lack of acclimatization.

Resulting health problems include heat stroke, heat exhaustion, heat cramps, or heat rashes. 

Heat can also increase the risk of injuries in workers as it may result in sweaty palms, fogged-up safety glasses, and dizziness.

These problems are most often associated with construction or agricultural workers, but they also impact factory workers, miners, boiler room workers and others. 

Workers with the greatest risks are those over 65, overweight, have heart disease, high blood pressure or are using medication impacted by extreme heat.

Contest Rules 

The contest is open to companies in all industries. 

A panel of subject matter experts from OSHA and other federal agencies will judge submissions. 

Contest submissions must:

• Promote and protect worker safety and health.
• Inform workers and employers about the hazards of heat in the workplace (indoor and/or outdoor).
• Be original creations, not copied from OSHA.gov or any other source, and under the submitter’s ownership and control.
• Be in an easily accessible format, e.g., webpage, URL, JPEG, PDF, MP3, PNG, etc.
• Acknowledge contest rules and provide contact information.
• Be consistent with current scientific research and OSHA guidelines.
• Be available for free public access.

Judges will chose winners based on the following factors: 

• Innovation
• Creativity
• Strength of message 
• Best non-English language entry
• Indoor heat emphasis
• Young worker emphasis

All submissions are due by June 9, 2023. 

OSHA has additional information about the contest and submission instructions online.