Health & Safety News

Prioritising research safety doesn’t impede science or the research.

I did a risk assessment of the harm that could result from not doing a risk assessment and decided it wasn’t worth it. 

For those of us who use the keyboard for a lot of our work tasks – i.e writing research papers, reviewing research papers, writing proposals, typing lengthy emails; the Dictate function available in Word can assist in giving yourself a break from the keyboard work.

Long hair and loose clothing, if not securely restrained, can become contaminated by your work, or worse, can become caught in unguarded moving/spinning parts of equipment that is operated either by you or someone nearby. 

Online vendors are selling high powered lasers without adequate safety provisions. (Try googling “laser cutters”). Lasers are capable of causing devastating eye injuries and they can be easily obtained.

The use of a respirator requires a good seal between the respirator and the wearer’s face to allow maximum protection from airborne contaminants. Workers must pass a respirator fit-test before they first start wearing a tight-fitting respirator.

In some cases when UNSW purchases chemicals from overseas suppliers, it is classified as the importer, although in many cases we would import these chemicals for research or sample analysis purposes only.

Let’s look at some of the hazards on campus that will affect you and how we expect you to help prevent injuries to yourself and to others.

UNSW is committed to protecting its staff, students, contractors and visitors from all hazards including second-hand smoke.

Your safety is UNSW Security’s top priority. We have developed a range of tools, services and even an app to help you stay safe both on and off our campus.

UNSW has investing over $75,000 in the past 2 years to rollout 18 life saving defibrillators across UNSW’s Kensington campus as well as the CBD campus and research stations.