Division of Labor and Industry

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The Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation, Division of Labor and Industry in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics conducts the Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) program. CFOI provides a complete count of all fatal work injuries occurring in Maryland and in the United States in each calendar year.

Preliminary results for Maryland, 2011

In 2011, fatal work injuries in Maryland totaled 71 according to the preliminary results from the Maryland Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) program. The majority of these cases are not under MOSH jurisdiction. This count remains unchanged from 2010's final count for the State. Final fatality numbers for Maryland and the nation will be released in April 2013.

Highlights from the Maryland Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, 2011

• The construction industry sector had the largest number of fatalities in the State with 13, down from 18 in the previous year. The specialty trade contractor industry (NAICS 238) accounted for 11 of the worker deaths in 2011.
   
• Transportation and warehousing (NAICS 48-49) had the second-highest fatality count with 11, compared to 9 in 2010. Transportation incidents accounted for eight worker deaths in this sector in 2011.
   
• The administrative and support and waste management and remediation services sector (NAICS 56) followed with 10 work-related fatalities, up from 7 in the prior year. Half of these incidents in 2011 occurred in landscaping services.
   
• Transportation and material moving occupations had the highest number of workplace fatalities in Maryland with 20. The majority of these fatalities (12) were heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers. Workers in construction and extraction occupations had the next-highest fatality count at 11.
   
• Men accounted for 65, or 92 percent, of the work-related fatalities in the state, the same percentage as the nation. Transportation incidents made up 40 percent of fatalities among men in Maryland.
   
• In Maryland, 46 percent of those who died from a workplace injury were white, non-Hispanic. This was lower than the 71 percent reported for this racial group nationwide. Thirty-eight percent of fatally injured in Maryland were black or African-American, non-Hispanic. African-Americans accounted for 9 percent of work-related deaths in the nation. The number of Hispanic or Latino fatalities declined in Maryland from the previous year's count of 12 down to 8 in 2011. In addition, Hispanic or Latino workers accounted for 11 percent of the State-wide total.
   
• Of the 71 fatality cases in Maryland, 79 percent of the decedents worked for wages and salaries; the remainder were self-employed. The most frequent fatal event for a wage and salary worker was a transportation incident, while for the self-employed it was violence and other injuries by persons or animals.
   
• The month recording the most fatalities was June with 10 reported cases. The fewest deaths were recorded in October with 3.

Technical Notes

The CFOI program uses diverse State and federal data sources to identify, verify and profile fatal work injuries. Information about each workplace fatality (e.g., industry, occupation, and other worker characteristics, such as, the equipment used and circumstances of the event) is obtained by cross-referencing multiple source documents, such as death certificates, workers' compensation reports, news media accounts, and reports to State and federal agencies. Diverse sources are used because studies have shown that no single source captures all job-related fatalities. The documents are matched so that each fatality is counted only once. These methods assure counts are as complete and accurate as possible.

For a fatality to be included in the census, the decedent must have been employed (that is, working for pay, compensation, or profit) at the time of the event, engaged in a legal work activity, or present at the site of the incident as a requirement of his or her job. Fatalities to volunteers and unpaid family workers who perform the same duties and functions as paid workers are also included in the count. These criteria are generally broader than those used by State and federal agencies administering specific laws and regulations. (Fatalities that occur during a person's normal commute to or from work are excluded from the census counts.)
Data presented in this release include deaths occurring in 2011 that resulted from traumatic occupational injuries. An injury is defined as any wound or damage to the body resulting from acute exposure to energy, such as heat, electricity, or impact from a crash or fall, or from the absence of such essentials as heat or oxygen, caused by a specific event or incident within a single workday or shift. Included are open wounds, intracranial and internal injuries, heatstroke, hypothermia, asphyxiation, acute poisonings resulting from short-term exposures limited to the worker's shift, suicides and homicides, and work injuries listed as underlying or contributory causes of death.

The CFOI program presents data for all fatal work injuries, regardless of whether the decedent was working in a job covered under the regulatory oversight of the Maryland Occupational Safety and Health Agency or other State and Federal agencies. Thus, any comparison between the Maryland CFOI counts and those released by other agencies should take into account the different coverage requirements and definitions being used by each agency.

Information on work-related fatal illnesses is not reported in the Maryland Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries because the latency period associated with many types of occupational illness, and the difficulty of linking those illnesses to work exposures, make identification of a universe problematic.