Chapter 3 - Health
                                       

The CHASP system was introduced in 1997 for the reporting of all work related incidents. In April 2000 a second version of CHASP was launched, introducing improvements to the system and clarification of the data types required for analysis and reporting. This new version was widely publicised and promoted, leading to a noticeable improvement in reporting adverse health and safety incidents on the CHASP system. During 2004/05, the Army trialled a new system for reporting health and safety incidents, allowing Army personnel to report health and safety incidents to a dedicated 24 hour call centre (Army Incident Notification Cell, AINC). Following the success of the Army system both the Navy (Naval Service Incident Notification Cell, NSINC) and Defence Equipment and Support (Defence Equipment and Support Incident Notification Cell, DINC) have rolled out similar systems for collating health and safety incidents. These initiatives have resulted in improvements in the number of events reported on the system, as can be seen in Table 3.10 and Table 3.11 below.

The number of major injuries and illnesses reported on the Central Health and Safety Project (CHASP) system increased in 2006 to 430 from 85 in 1997, an increase of 406% (see Table 3.10). The rate of major injury and illnesses increased over the nine years from 26 per 100,000 MOD personnel in to 153 per 100,000.

The number of serious injuries and illnesses recorded on the CHASP system increased in 2006 to 1,550 from 530 in 1997, an increase of 192% (see Table 3.11 below). The rate of serious injury and illnesses reported on CHASP increased over the nine years from 162 per 100,000 MOD personnel in 1997 to 550 per 100,000 in 2006.

The increases in the rates of major and serious injuries and illnesses are thought to be due to the introduction of single Service notification cells and increasing health and safety awareness in general.
Table 3.11 Serious Injuries and Illnesses UK Service Personnel and Civilians by financial year,                          numbers and rates per 100,000 1,2,3,4
Serious injuries and illnesses are those that are not defined as "major" according to the HSE criteria, but which could result in a person being unable to perform their normal duties for more than three days.

The data in this table are outside the scope of National Statistics because they do not meet all of the high professional quality assurance standards set out in the National Statistics Code of Practice.

Numbers 1997   1998   1999   2000   2001   2002   2003   2004   2005   2006
Total 530   1370   1365   1370   1235   990   1010   1190   1300   1550
Naval Service
 60   180   125   130   115   60   60   75   75   120
Army
 45   325   370   360   430   415   430   630   765   980
Royal Air Force
 90   235   200   245   180   155   180   185   165   110
Civilian
 340   630   675   635   515   360   335   300   295   340
 
                                      
Rate (per 100,000 strength)
 1997   1998   1999   2000   2001   2002   2003   2004   2005   2006
Total
 162   428   432   438   405   330   337   398   447   550
Naval Service
 132   408   285   305   269   145   148   185   194   306
Army
 39   296   335   328   392   376   385   563   704   914
Royal Air Force
 156   419   365   446   337   293   339   345   327   230
Civilian
 294   572   623   600   515   379   361   324   320   388
Source: DASA (Health Information)
1. The numbers provided in the table include both regular and reservist personnel, MOD civilian staff, and any other civilians injured on MOD property or in/by     MOD vehicles.
2. Figures exclude H&S related fatalities.
3. Rates calculated using Armed Forces strengths as the denominator.
4. The numbers of injuries have been rounded to the nearest 5, and therefore may not always add up to the totals provided.