Workplace Fatalities Dip

 A total of 5,488 fatal workplace injuries were recorded in the United States in 2007, a decrease of 6 percent from the revised total of 5,840 fatal work injuries reported for 2006, according to a report by the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The results are preliminary, but the bureau says the workplace fatality number was the smallest since it began conducting the report in 1992. Final results for 2007 will be released in April 2009.

Based on these preliminary counts, the rate of fatal injury for U.S. workers in 2007 was 3.7 fatal work injuries per 100,000 workers, down from the final rate of 4.0 per 100,000 workers in 2006, and the lowest annual fatality rate ever reported by the fatality census.

The number of fatal falls in 2007 rose to a high of 835--a 39 percent increase since 1992 when the program was first conducted.

Meanwhile, transportation incidents, which typically account for two-fifths of all workplace fatalities, fell to a low of 2,234 cases in 2007.

However, workplace homicides rose 13 percent to 610 in 2007 after reaching a low of 540 in 2006.

Fatal occupational injuries incurred by non-Hispanic Black or African American workers were at the highest level since 1999, but fatal work injuries among Hispanic workers were lower by 8 percent in 2007.