The legal obligation on employers to carry out risk assessments to "ensure, so far as reasonably practicable, the safety, health and welfare at work" of employees and others must now also include a thorough assessment of the risks to health and safety posed by the millennium bug. One fact to emerge from the Health and Safety Authority (HSA) conference, held last week in association with NIFAST Liberty Risk Services on the Y2K bug, was the confusion evident in the findings of a hospital survey on the bug. The survey ranked people's perceptions of the hospital's most critical systems in face of the threat of the millennium bug. It revealed that people thought a fax machine was more critical than a CT scanner, while PCs were ranked more highly than ventilators. The survey also suggested the telephone system was perceived as a more critical item for patients' health and safety than a cardiac monitor or dialysis machine.
From the health and safety viewpoint, a lesson can be drawn from that survey - employers and health and safety professionals need to expand their assessment of possible health and safety risks posed by the Y2K bug beyond computers, telephones and fax machines.
Likewise, risk management of the health and safety threats posed by the Y2K bug should not be limited to the information technology (IT) or computer departments. For instance, a Y2K project manager in a hospital might have oversight over Y2K risk assessment by the heads of the computer department, the laboratory, or the estates (heating, ventilation, communications etc.), medical devices and users' (clinical and administrative) departments.
Next New Year's Eve there will probably be the biggest party in history. If you are the proprietor of a pub, restaurant, hotel or night club - to name but a few businesses that could be vulnerable to the Y2K bug - can you be sure your fire detection and suppression systems will work that night in the event of a fire? Waiting until New Year's Day to find out could be deemed criminally negligent as the risks posed to fire safety systems by Y2K problems have been well documented.
Employers are also obliged to find out if their access systems are Y2K compliant. For instance, lift controls could be affected. Failure to investigate this workplace risk and to take immediate steps to put right any deficiencies could see employees or customers trapped in buildings and possibly in dangerous circumstances.
Security alarms and video systems could also be brought down by Y2K, possibly endangering the life of people meant to be protected by such systems. Workplace lubrication systems could be affected, which could cause injuries to workers from malfunctioning machinery. Equipment with in-built maintenance or repair schedules could also fail, endangering workers at the rollover date or subsequently.
Air treatment systems could be affected, as could refrigeration and heating systems. And any kind of electronic control panel could fail, including waste treatment and atmospheric emission controls, all of which could have serious implications for health and safety.
The HSA warns that in addition to the roll-over date from December 31st 1999 to January 1st 2000, other imminent dates which could affect safety systems or lead to health hazards are: September 8th 1999 to September 9th 1999; February 28th 2000 to February 29th 2000; February 29th 2000 to March 1st 2000; December 30th 2000 to December 31st 2000; and December 31st 2000 to January 1st 2001.
So what should an employer do? A good starting point is to get a copy of the free eight-page booklet Are You Ready for the Millennium Bug?* published by the HSA in association with NIFAST Liberty Risk Services.
Britain's Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has also produced publications which were highly recommended at the launch of the HSA booklet. These include the Real Time Engineering Ltd research report Safety and the Year 2000 which costs £15 sterling (#21.22) and Testing Safety-Related Control Systems for Year 2000 Compliance **, which costs £5.50 sterling.
Free guidance is also available from the HSE via the Internet. One such free online publication is Health and Safety and the Year 2000 Problem, which is aimed at small and medium-size enterprises. Another recommended resource is Contingency Planning for a Safe Year 2000, while next Monday will see the free online publication of the HSE's Year 2000 Risk Assessment ***.
The new free HSA booklet is available from the HSA, 10 Hogan Place, Dublin 2. Telephone: 01 614 7000; Fax: 01 614 7020; Email: web-info@hsa.ie. See also: http://www.hsa.ie/osh ** For further details, see www.hsebooks.co.uk. *** Can be downloaded from: (www.open.gov.uk/hse.hsehome. htm).
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