Workplace fatalities claimed the lives of over a thousand Iranian workers between March and September, a notable year-on-year increase that labor activists attribute to authorities' lack of attention to worker safety.
According to data from Iran's Legal Medicine Organization, the figure from the year 1403 (March 21 to September 22, 2024) represents an average of roughly 180 deaths per month, or approximately 45 workers per week, a 15-percent rise year on year.
The majority of the victims were male (1,066), with 11 female workers also losing their lives. Tehran province recorded the highest number of deaths with 217, followed by Isfahan with 81 and Mazandaran with 70.
The most common cause of death in the first six months of the 1403 was falls from height, accounting for 498 fatalities, followed by being struck by hard objects (246 deaths), electrocution (155 deaths), burns (65 deaths), and suffocation (35 deaths). The cause of death for 78 workers was not specified in the report.
Data from the Statistical Center of Iran shows that the number of fatalities rose from 1,625 in the Iranian year 1397 (March 2018-March 2019) to 2,115 in 1402 (March 2023-March 2024), marking a 30% increase over that period.
Labour activists attribute the escalating number of workplace deaths to a lack of safety measures by employers, negligence, and inadequate oversight by labor inspectors.
Ehsan Sohrabi, a labor activist and former member of the Supreme Council for Technical Protection, criticized the Ministry of Labour's lack of attention to worker safety.
He told ILNA that while official figures from the Ministry of Labour and Social Security tend to be lower, the Legal Medicine Organization's data provides a more reliable picture of the increasing rate of workplace accidents and fatalities.
Sohrabi warned that the full-year statistics for 1403 are likely to show a further record increase in workplace deaths, emphasizing that safety in workshops is not being taken seriously and warnings are being ignored.
"If the overall statistics for workplace accidents in the year 1403 are published by the country's Legal Medicine Organization, we will realize that we have once again broken records in this area. Safety in workshops is not taken seriously, and unfortunately, warnings fall on deaf ears," he said.
