Be Seen!

The Instituto Nacional de Seguridad e Higiene en el Trabajo (INSHT), the Spanish national health and safety at work institute, collaborating with Invassat, has launched a pilot campaign under the slogan “Hazte visible”, which translates to “Become visible”, or simply “Be seen”, with the aim of preventing accidents at work amongst home delivery drivers.

In recent years, businesses that are related to food and food delivery are booming and the enormous development of the Internet contributes to this: ordering food at home, booking restaurants through applications, etc., all of which are increasingly common activities. In 2015, the year for which the latest data is available from INSHT, 1,565 motorcyclists from the “Food and Beverage Services” sector, had a traffic incident whilst making their deliveries. Of those, 83 were hospitalised due to the seriousness of their injuries and one died. Of the total number of those injured, 61% were under 26 years old.

The activity of food and beverage services has a high incident rate during the working day, occupying the third place in index of incidence. In addition, in the last four years there has been an increase of 36.2% in this incidence rate.

Primarily, the aim of the campaign is two-fold, firstly to remind road users of the importance of checking their “blind spots” before moving off or altering speed, course or direction, and secondly to make more vulnerable road users more visible, such as moped or motorbike riders, as well as larger vehicle drivers when they leave their vehicles.

Always check fully around your vehicle, including over your shoulder, before performing any move. You never know who or what could be in your blind spot until you check.