France

Organization responsible for the statistics

Collection: Regional sickness insurance funds (fifteen) and large State enterprises.

Compilation and publication: Caisse Nationale de l'Assurance Maladie des Travailleurs Salariés (CNAMTS) (National Sickness Insurance Fund for Paid Employees).

Periodicity

Annual.

Source

Occupational injury reports submitted to regional sickness insurance funds.

Objectives and users

Information not available.

Coverage

Persons:

All paid employees.

In 1995, approximately 14,795,000 employees were covered.

Economic activities:

All economic activities, except public administration and services.

Geographic areas:

The whole country, except the overseas départements and territories.

Establishments:

All types and sizes of establishment.

Types of occupational accidents covered

The statistics relate to compensated injuries due to all types of occupational accidents, excluding commuting accidents.

Statistics on occupational diseases are compiled and published separately from those of occupational injuries.

Concepts and definitions

(Source: Social Security Code).

Occupational accident:

regardless of its cause, where it occurred, or the type of work involved, an accident arising out of or in connection with work sustained by any paid employee or person working for one or more employers or heads of enterprise. (This definition, provided by jurisprudence, recognizes an event as an accident if it meets three criteria: that it be external in origin and characterized by violence and suddenness. In practice, however, the only criteria used is that of suddenness, which helps to distinguish between accidents and diseases.)

Temporary incapacity to work:

information not available.

Accidents with permanent incapacity:

accidents leading to either the grant of a permanent disability pension or to death.

Minimum period of absence from work: one full day, not including the day on which the accident occurred.

Maximum period for death to be considered a fatal occupational injury: not applicable. However, the only cases included in the statistics are those in which the injured person died before stabilization of his/her condition, that is, before determination of a rate of permanent disability and settlement of a pension. Deaths occurring after stabilization of the injured person's condition do not appear in the data.

Types of information compiled

(a) personal characteristics of persons injured: sex, age, nationality, occupational qualification;

(b) amount of worktime lost: lost workdays;

(c) characteristics of accidents: place of accident, agency;

(d) characteristics of injuries: part of body injured, type of injury;

(e) characteristics of employers or workplaces: economic activity;

(f) other characteristics: regional sickness insurance fund.

Measurement of worktime lost

Worktime lost is measured in calendar days. It is compiled only for non-fatal cases of temporary disability.

Classifications

(a) fatal or non-fatal accidents;

(b) extent of disability:

with loss of working time, with permanent disability;

(c) economic activity;

(d) occupation:

professional qualification (managers and technicians, supervisors, employees, apprentices, unskilled workers, skilled workers, miscellaneous, unspecified);

(e) type of injury:

type of injury: fracture, burn, frostbite, amputation, wound (cut, abrasion, other wound) excluding puncture wound, puncture wound, contusion, inflammation, sprain, dislocation, asphyxia, concussion, presence of a foreign body, hernia, pain, overexertion, lumbago, poisoning, dermatitis, visual function disorder, hearing disorder, muscle or tendon tear, nerve injury, multiple injuries, other, unspecified;

location of injury: head (excluding eyes), eyes, upper limbs (excluding hands), hand, trunk, lower limbs (excluding feet), foot, multiple body parts, internal locations, unspecified;

(f) cause of accident:

information not available.

(g) duration of absence from work:

information not available;

(h) characteristics of workers:

sex, age group (under 20, five-year age groups from 20 to 64, 65 and over), nationality (French, foreign national, national of EEC member country, unspecified);

(i) characteristics of accidents:

place of accident: journey from home to the workplace and vice versa; journey made during working hours on behalf of employer; usual workplace (workshop or construction site); worker's residence;

material agency: traffic and working surfaces (accidents on the same level); traffic and working surfaces (accidents involving a fall from heights or into depths); objects being handled; objects being transported manually; objects, substances, particles moved accidentally; lifting and handling equipment; lifting, mooring, gripping machines and equipment; vehicles (excluding handling trolleys listed under item 6); power transformers and prime movers; transmission machinery (inside or outside machine); grinding, crushing, pulveriying or dividing machines; kneading or mixing machines; sifting, screening or separating machines; power presses and pounders; pressing, molding and injecting machines; cylinder machines for laminating, stretching, planing, printing, mixing; cutting, slicing, unrolling, fiber separating machines (other than saws); saws; metal punching, drilling, rotating, reaming, polishing machines; punching, rotating, spinning, or planing machines for wood and similar materials; milling, buffing, polishing machines; welding machines and equipment; sewing, stapling or eyeletting machines; filling, packing, wrapping, seasoning or nailing machines; tearing, opening, beating, carding machines; spinning, weaving, cable-making, and finishing machines (other than those listed in item 25); equipment and machines for earth-moving and related jobs; miscellaneous machines not falling under any of the foregoing categories (11-27); machines not specified in the accident report; hand-held or guided mechanical tools (power driven, pneumatic or other means of electrical power); individual hand tools; pressure vessels; equipment or implements for processing hot substances, furnaces, kilns, cooking equipment, etc.; refrigerating equipment and plants; equipment and implements for handling caustic, corrosive, toxic substances; harmful vapours, gases and dusts; inflammable substances on fire; explosive substances; electricity; ionizing or non-ionizing radiations; agencies other than those listed above: workplace fires, brawls, games and sports, animals, lightening; reports not classified due to insufficient data; unspecified;

(j) characteristics of employers or workplaces:

not applicable;

(k) other:

regional sickness insurance fund.

Reference period

Year.

An injury is included in the statistics for the period (year) in which it is recognized as resulting from an occupational accident and in which the claim is accepted by the insurance fund.

In the case of fatal injuries, the year the claim is accepted is the year in which the occupational nature of the accident that caused the death is recognized.

Worktime lost is included in each period (year) in which worktime is lost.

Estimates

Total number of occupational injuries and workdays lost.

Rates:

Historical background of the series

Information not available.

Documentation

Series available:

The following tables (among others) are published:
  1. number of employees, number of employees injured with loss of working time and with permanent disability, number of workdays lost, number of deaths, by:
  2. number of persons injured with loss of working time and with permanent disability, and workdays lost, and their percentage distribution, by economic activity and:
  3. number of persons injured with loss of working time and with permanent incapacity, and workdays lost, and their percentage distribution, by regional sickness insurance fund and:

Bibliographic references:

The data are published in:

Caisse Nationale de l'Assurance Maladie des Travailleurs Salariés: Statistiques financières et technologiques des accidents du travail (annual).

Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques (INSEE): Annuaire statistique de la France (annual).

Methodological notes appear in each of these publications along with the data.

Data published by ILO:

The following data are furnished regularly to the ILO for publication in the Yearbook of Labour Statistics, relating to compensated injuries according to major division of economic activity: number of persons fatally injured; total number of persons injured; number of workdays lost by persons injured with lost workdays; rates of fatal injuries. The number of persons at risk (total number of persons employed) is also supplied and stored in the LABORSTA database.

Confidentiality:

Information not available.

International standards

Information not available.

Method of data collection

Legislation:

Social Security Code.

Any occupational injury resulting from an employment accident must be reported by the employer to the primary sickness insurance fund to which the injured person belongs within 48 hours (not including Sundays and holidays) of the accident or of the time the employer was informed of the accident in cases occurring outside the enterprise.

Reporting:

The person injured in an occupational accident must report it to his/her employer. The accident must be reported to the employer or to one of his/her representatives within 24 hours of the accident, except in cases of force majeure, in cases where this is absolutely impossible, or where a legitimate reason is provided. The injured person must report the accident directly to his or her primary sickness insurance fund in the event the employer fails to do so (in which case the injured person is granted a period of two years, starting from the date of the accident, to file his or her report) or in the event of a relapse due to an occupational accident (notification must be made immediately, accompanied by the medical certificate attesting to the decline in the injured person's condition). Employers are required to complete certain formalities; penalties are applied in the case of non-compliance. The latter must furnish the injured person with an occupational accident sheet from the Social Security institution entitling the injured person to certain benefits in kind: treatment, medicines, etc. Employers must also report the accident to the primary sickness insurance fund to which the injured person belongs. The latter, in turn, informs the labour inspector of the accident. The accident must be reported on a special form and submitted to the social security fund by means of a registered letter, with return receipt requested. Special provisions apply to occupational accidents that occur outside the country. Minor occupational accidents are simply listed in the enterprise infirmary records. The attending physician is required to furnish the necessary medical certificates.

Data reported:

The form for notification of occupational accident includes the following information:
  1. information about the employer (permanent establishment to which the injured person is attached): name, address, SIRET number;
  2. information about the injured person: registration number, sex, birthdate, name, address, nationality (French, EEC member country, other), date hired, occupational qualification, length of service in post, indication as to whether there were other injured persons as a result of the accident;
  3. information about the accident: date, time, working hours of the injured person the day of the accident, place of accident (at usual workplace: workshop, office, construction site, at occasional workplace, while away from the workplace on behalf of the employer, at the employee's residence, en route between usual place where employee takes his/her meals and workplace), including the location and the precise site of the accident; detailed circumstances of the accident (what the injured person was doing at the time of the accident: working with a machine, handling, etc, and how the accident occurred: by slipping, striking against an object, etc.); place injured person was transported for medical treatment, indication as to whether the accident was caused by a third party;
  4. information about the injury: location (bodily location of the injury) including indication as to whether the left side or right side was injured; nature of injury (contusion, wound, lumbago, sprain, burn, puncture wound, presence of a foreign body, multiple injuries, other); part of body injured (hand, leg, head, other); name of hospital or clinic where injured person received medical treatment; indication as to whether or not there was a loss of working time, or whether death resulted.

Changes planned:

Information not available.