<div style="max-width: 740px; margin: 0px auto; padding: 0px 2px; font-family: Inter, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, &quot;Segoe UI&quot;, Roboto, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(65, 72, 86); -webkit-font-smoothing: antialiased;"><div style="display: flex; align-items: center; gap: 8px; margin: 0px 0px 14px;"><p>FOOD SAFE JOURNAL</p></div><h1 style="margin: 0px 0px 14px; color: rgb(14, 20, 34); letter-spacing: -0.02em; text-align: left; font-size: 32px; line-height: 1.2;"><strong>Manual Handling Is Still Ireland's Most Common Workplace Injury</strong></h1><div style="width: 74px; height: 4px; border-radius: 3px; margin: 0px 0px 22px; background: linear-gradient(90deg, #65C93E 0%, #4EA82A 100%);"><p></p></div><p style="margin: 0px 0px 20px; font-size: 19px; line-height: 1.6; color: rgb(44, 51, 64);"><strong>Manual handling and slips, trips and falls remain the most common triggers of non-fatal workplace injury in Ireland. HSA and CSO figures record roughly 688,000 working days lost to work-related injury in 2024.</strong></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">Hospitality does not think of itself as a lifting industry. There are no pallets and no scaffolding. There is, however, a delivery every morning, a cellar, a bin run, stacks of plates, catering trays out of a low oven, and a walk-in whose heaviest items are always on the bottom shelf.</p><h2 style="margin: 42px 0px 14px; color: rgb(14, 20, 34); letter-spacing: -0.01em; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(230, 232, 236); padding-bottom: 9px; text-align: left; font-size: 23px; line-height: 1.25;"><strong>The context in 2025</strong></h2><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">The Health and Safety Authority reported 58 work-related deaths in Ireland in 2025, a 61% increase on the 36 recorded in 2024. Fatalities are concentrated in other sectors, but the trend is a reminder of what the enforcement climate looks like — and non-fatal injury is where hospitality's exposure actually sits.</p><h2 style="margin: 42px 0px 14px; color: rgb(14, 20, 34); letter-spacing: -0.01em; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(230, 232, 236); padding-bottom: 9px; text-align: left; font-size: 23px; line-height: 1.25;"><strong>Why the training so often fails</strong></h2><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">Most people have sat through manual handling training. Most people still lift badly. The reason is that the usual format teaches knowledge and tests knowledge, and technique is neither.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">You can pass a multiple-choice question about bending your knees while lifting like you always have. Nobody watches. Nobody corrects you. The certificate says trained; the back does not know that.</p><h2 style="margin: 42px 0px 14px; color: rgb(14, 20, 34); letter-spacing: -0.01em; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(230, 232, 236); padding-bottom: 9px; text-align: left; font-size: 23px; line-height: 1.25;"><strong>TILE — the part that is genuinely useful</strong></h2><ul style="margin: 18px 0px 8px; padding: 6px 0px; list-style: none; border: 1px solid rgb(230, 232, 236); border-radius: 16px; background: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box;"><li style="color: rgb(65, 72, 86); margin: 0px; padding: 15px 22px; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.55;"><strong>Task</strong> — what is actually being done? Twisting, carrying far, lifting from the floor, repeating it forty times a shift?</li><li style="color: rgb(65, 72, 86); margin: 0px; padding: 15px 22px; border-top: 1px solid rgb(237, 239, 242); font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.55;"><strong>Individual</strong> — who is doing it? Their build, their experience, whether they are pregnant, young, or returning from injury.</li><li style="color: rgb(65, 72, 86); margin: 0px; padding: 15px 22px; border-top: 1px solid rgb(237, 239, 242); font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.55;"><strong>Load</strong> — how heavy, how bulky, is it stable, can it be gripped, is it hot or awkward?</li><li style="color: rgb(65, 72, 86); margin: 0px; padding: 15px 22px; border-top: 1px solid rgb(237, 239, 242); font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.55;"><strong>Environment</strong> — wet floor, tight corner, poor light, a step, a door you have to hold.</li></ul><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">The point of TILE is that it usually finds a fix that is not the lift at all. Move the heavy stock to waist height. Split the delivery into two trips. Fix the light in the cellar. The safest lift is the one nobody has to do.</p><h2 style="margin: 42px 0px 14px; color: rgb(14, 20, 34); letter-spacing: -0.01em; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(230, 232, 236); padding-bottom: 9px; text-align: left; font-size: 23px; line-height: 1.25;"><strong>Your legal footing</strong></h2><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">Manual handling is dealt with specifically in the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (General Application) Regulations 2007. The duty runs in order: avoid hazardous manual handling where reasonably practicable; where you cannot avoid it, assess it; and then reduce the risk, which includes training the people doing it.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 16px; font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72; color: rgb(65, 72, 86);">Assessment comes before training. Training people to lift a load you could have eliminated is doing the second thing without the first.</p><ol style="margin: 18px 0px; padding: 22px 24px 22px 44px; background: rgb(245, 250, 230); border: 1px solid rgb(226, 239, 176); border-radius: 16px; color: rgb(65, 72, 86); font-size: 17px; line-height: 1.72;"><li style="margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Walk your building and list the lifts that actually happen — deliveries, cellar, bins, ovens, laundry.</li><li style="margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Run TILE on each one and fix what can be fixed by changing the task, not the person.</li><li style="margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Assess what remains, and write it down.</li><li style="margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Train the people doing those lifts — and make sure somebody watches them lift.</li><li style="margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Re-assess when the job changes, after any incident, and at least annually.</li></ol><blockquote style="margin: 34px 0px; padding: 30px 28px; background: linear-gradient(155deg, rgb(19, 32, 59) 0%, rgb(11, 16, 32) 100%); border-radius: 18px; box-sizing: border-box;"><h3 style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; color: rgb(255, 255, 255); letter-spacing: -0.01em; text-align: left; font-size: 20px; line-height: 1.2;"><strong>Training where someone actually watches you lift.</strong></h3><p style="margin: 0px 0px 14px; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.65; color: rgb(201, 210, 228);">Our manual handling course includes a real practical: three lifts recorded on video and reviewed by a QQI Level 6 Instructor. If your technique is not right, you are told exactly what to change.</p><p style="margin: 10px 0px 0px;"><a href="/manual-handling-courses" style="display: inline-block; background: #65C93E; color: rgb(14, 20, 34); text-decoration: none; font-weight: 800; font-size: 16px; padding: 13px 24px; border-radius: 10px;">See the course</a></p></blockquote><hr><p style="margin: 0px 0px 8px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.6; color: rgb(107, 114, 128);"><strong>Sources</strong></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 6px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.6; color: rgb(107, 114, 128);">HSA — Sharp rise in work-related fatalities in 2025 — <a href="https://www.hsa.ie/eng/news_events_media/news/press_releases_2026/health-and-safety-authority-reports-sharp-rise-in-work-related-fatalities-in-2025/" style="color: rgb(46, 95, 208); text-decoration: underline; text-underline-offset: 2px; font-weight: 600;">https://www.hsa.ie/eng/news_events_media/news/press_releases_2026/health-and-safety-authority-reports-sharp-rise-in-work-related-fatalities-in-2025/</a></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 6px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.6; color: rgb(107, 114, 128);">Health and Safety Authority — <a href="https://www.hsa.ie/" style="color: rgb(46, 95, 208); text-decoration: underline; text-underline-offset: 2px; font-weight: 600;">https://www.hsa.ie/</a></p><p style="margin: 12px 0px 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.6; color: rgb(107, 114, 128);">This article is general guidance, not legal advice. Your own HACCP plan, safety statement and the officer inspecting your premises are what govern your business.</p></div>

Manual handling and slips, trips and falls remain the leading triggers of non-fatal workplace injury in Ireland — and hospitality does more lifting than most sectors admit.

Manual Handling Is Still Ireland's Most Common Workplace Injury

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Manual Handling Is Still Ireland's Most Common Workplace Injury

Manual Handling Is Still Ireland's Most Common Workplace Injury

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