Fleets are being warned of the rising use of drugs and alcohol which is causing concern about impairment in the workplace.
The warning comes from a medical and safety technology company, Drager Safety UK, after its research highlighted drugs and alcohol use was a prevalent concern among managers in transport and logistics.
In the report, which assesses the impact of Covid-19, Brexit and workplace culture on health and safety in UK workplaces, six-in-ten managers (61%) who work in the industry, say their organisation is extremely concerned about workplace impairment and resulting injuries and accidents due to alcohol and drug use, and that their companies include the issue in their safety procedures and policies.
A further third (32%) are quite concerned but have not yet factored the problem within their safety policy. These figures fall to 53% and 21% across all industries which took part in the research.
While concern for the impact of prescribed drugs was highest in the transport and logistics industry, this dropped to less than a half (45%) which were extremely concerned and had policies in place.
However, this means that 55% of the industry are not taking any active steps to curb the growing use of prescription medicines, Drager said.
Road safety charity Brake states that drug driving, including prescription medication, is a factor in one-in-20 fatal crashes, and driving under the influence of cocaine or opiates more than doubles the risk of a fatal accident, while combining cannabis with alcohol increases the risk by 16 times.
