In 2006/07, an estimated 1 144 000 people in Great Britain believed they were suffering from a musculoskeletal disorder that was caused or made worse by their current or pastwork (see Table SWIT3). This equates to 2700 per 100 000 people (2.7%) who have ever worked in Great Britain, statistically significantly higher (see Table SWIT3SIG) than the corresponding rates in 2005/06 and 2004/05 (both 2400 per 100 000 people – 2.4%) and similar (not statistically significantly different) to those in 2003/04 and 2001/02 (both 2600 per 100 000 people – 2.6%)
In total, an estimated 22% of sufferers, 247 000 people ever employed, first became aware of their work-related musculoskeletal disorder in the previous 12 months (see Table SWIT6E). In terms of people employed in the last 12 months, this equates to an estimated 790 per 100 000 people (0.79%) with a new work-related musculoskeletal disorder in this period (see Table SWIT6W12). This rate was statistically significantly higher than the corresponding rates of 580 per 100 000 people (0.58%) in 2005/06, 650 per 100 000 people (0.65%) in 2004/05, and 640 per 100 000 people (0.64%) in 2003/04, but was similar (not statistically significantly different) to that of 750 per 100 000 people (0.75%) in 2001/02 (see Table SWIT6W12SIG).
An estimated 10.7 million working days (full-day equivalent) were lost in 2006/07 through musculoskeletal disorders caused or made worse by work (see Table SWIT1). On average, each person suffering took an estimated 16.7 days off in that 12 month period. This equates to an annual loss of 0.46 days per worker, similar (not statistically significantly different) to the corresponding rates in 2005/06 (0.41 days), 2004/05 (0.50 days), 2003/04 (0.52 days) and 2001/02 (0.52 days) (see Table SWIT1SIG).
