Coinciding with National Suicide Prevention and Awareness Month, construction industry interests this September are calling attention to the industry’s disturbing occupational statistics on worker suicides (Fig 1. below).
The Construction Industry Alliance for Suicide Prevention’s (CIASP) website CIASP references U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data from 2015 Suicide Rates by Major Occupational Group — 17 States, 2012 and 2015 | MMWR, revealing male workers in the construction and extraction industry have the highest rate of suicide among 22 broad occupational groups. With 1,248 deaths in 2015, the industry had a rate of 53 per 100,000 workers, up from 44 per 100,000 in 2012 (Table below). The next highest include arts, design, entertainment, sports, and media workers, with 40 per 100,000.
Why the higher numbers?
Reasons cited for the industry’s higher rate include the dominant “tough guy” culture that can prevent troubled workers from seeking and obtaining mental health assistance and interventions; exposure to difficult working conditions that cause chronic injuries and time off from work; a higher-than-average rate of drug and alcohol use; and the often-unpredictable nature of the work that can lead to debilitating personal financial challenges.
An expert that Workwear Guru engaged on the issue, Kirk Bohl, vital statistics manager with state of Colorado’s Center for Health & Environmental Data, says data suggest that Colorado male construction worker suicides are highly correlated with drug and alcohol usage, “intimate partner” issues, and lack of history of connection with mental health assistance resources (Fig. 2 below).
“This suggests lower likelihoods of engaging with mental health and potentially identifying and addressing mental health issues that may play a role in suicide ideation, attempt, and death,” Bohl says.
Another expert, Dr. Sally Spencer-Thomas, who co-authored a piece entitled “Mental Illness & Suicide—Break the Silence & Create a Caring Culture” that prompted the Construction Financial Management Association to form the CIASP in 2016, observes that the industry’s higher rate is also tied to a heavy preponderance of males who may have greater access to firearms and other highly lethal means of attempting suicide. Problems that can build and lead to loss of hope and suicide, though, are abundant among construction workers and can be hard to address because “stoicism and tough-minded culture mean that people are often reluctant to reach out for help when they need it, and fearlessness can lead to impulsive risk-taking and lethal behavior.”
What can be done?
Part of the solution to reducing suicides might lie in changing the construction workplace culture to focus on mental health promotion — efforts being pursued by CIASP, CFMA, and others. Open awareness and discussion of the problem, de-stigmatization of mental health issues, and creation of environments that encourage employees to engage with mental health resources are key pillars of an approach that could cut down on suicides.
Encore Electric, Inc., Lakewood, Colo., began incorporating mental health into its employee assistance programs in 2019, and in 2020 made it possible for employees to quickly connect with mental health professionals via Talkspace and ComPsych. Any employer focus on employee wellness, says human resources director David Scott, today demands a mental health component.
“We want to treat our people as people, and when you do that you tend to begin to treat them with more empathy,” he says. “So, we installed some programs that put mental health on the front burner.”
Bill Heffernan, co-founder of ScreenSafe, Inc., a Chicago-based drug-free workplace consultancy, will deliver a presentation at the November meeting of the National Electrical Contractors Association’s (NECA’s) Safety Leadership Summit entitled, “The Impact of Construction Culture and Tradition on Worker Mental Health.” He tells EC&M that changing the workplace culture to recognize that mental health issues are as open for discussion as physical ones is a critical first step to interventions that can save lives.
“Substance use disorders, mental concerns, and suicide are prevalent but hidden issues in the construction trades,” he says. “These can be devasting to the employer and the tradespeople. As contractors and unions treat these issues similar to all other health and safety workplace issues, the workers and the workplace will benefit.”
Heffernan sees signs that the construction culture is slowly beginning to change as mental health and suicide grow to become acute societal problems and awareness grows that seeking help for problems that can disable and lead to suicide must be de-stigmatized.
“There is no shame or disgrace in having a mental health condition, just like there is no shame in having cancer or high blood pressure,” he says. “When we make it OK to talk about a health challenge, we can face it and develop strategies to address that challenge. We all pay the price for stigma.”
How to make changes
CFMA continues to encourage the construction industry to address the problem more directly, reminding companies that it requires a willingness to implement and lead change. In a new video posted on the CFMA site, David James, former chairman of CFMA’s suicide prevention committee, says management must lead teamwork-based efforts to make it easier for employees to get help with mental health issues.
“We need to beat the drum for suicide prevention and mental wellness within the construction industry,” he says. “Safety protocols won’t go away in our companies, nor should mental wellness protocols.”
Tom Zind is a freelance writer based in Lees Summit, Mo. He can be reached at [email protected].
