'Taking the piss' gets new meaning...

Inside this issue...

- Peeing on dead people should be illegal!
- Your week in review

Dear health and safety reader,

If you've been enjoying the quiet-ish roads this week, brace yourself! A lot of people will be going back to work next week, and schools will reopen... which means more traffic!

Peeing on dead people should be illegal!

What were they thinking? How can you actually pee on corpses? The shocking scandal of four Marines who urinated on Taliban corpses, has been making waves around the world. In my opinion, they should be tried and punished for the decimation of corpses. This situation can potentially aggravate the Obama administration's attempts to end the decade long war in Afghanistan.

Peeing on someone who's alive has health consequences. Although urine is not toxic, it is a waste product. It therefore contains compounds undesirable to the body and can be irritating to the skin and eyes. Urine contains a range of substances that vary with what is introduced into the body. Aside from water, urine contains an assortment of inorganic salts and organic compounds, including proteins, hormones, and a wide range of metabolites.

Your week in review

In case you've missed our other topics this week, have a look at this week's bulletins:

- Up and until recently, you had two options when it came to meeting OHSA requirements. Your first option was to enrol your staff in costly and time-consuming training sessions. And if, like most companies, your company didn’t budget for the R900 to R10 000 per person required for this, they probably told YOU to do the training. Now, you can get 5 legally-compliant health and safety training modules for less than R200 each!

- Something interesting... electricity always seeks the easiest path to the ground. It tries to find a conductor, such as metal, wet wood, water or your body! Your body is 70% water. So if you touch an energised bare wire or faulty appliance while you’re grounded, electricity will instantly pass through you to the ground, causing a harmful – or fatal – shock. Find out more and how to work safely with electricity by reading Shocking revelations… at the workplace

- If you’re in the Health and Safety industry, you already know that you MUST have a SHE file and that your SHE file MUST be up-to-date, 100% of the time. IS YOURS? At FSP, we’ve developed a product that will streamline your job and cut the amount of time you spend on paperwork in HALF, right out the gate! Get away with cutting corners in 2012... check this out!

- A vending machine to dispense medicine… is this acceptable? Medical testing and dispensing of medicines in the office has the potential to cause quite a stir. Another sensitive topic involves employees’ medical records… do you know what your employees’ rights are about disclosure? What about the dispensing of medicine in a vending machine at the office? Is this allowed? We’ve had some interesting questions from readers relating to these topics so I thought for today we’d tackle some of these issues. To find out the answers to these questions and more, click here!

That's all from me for today. If you'd like to comment on anything in today's email, or about the other topics, feel free to email me at liana@fsp.co.za!

Have a great weekend!
Liana Meadon

FSP Business: Health and Safety Advisor