Work is detrimental to your health. People even work themselves to death. In fact, people have worked themselves and their families to death.

Ask Cupido Adams, aged 72, of Prieska in the Northern Cape where one in seven of the population and over half of the miners who used to work in the blue asbestos mine outside the town suffer from lung diseases caused by asbestos. Adams, who sorted and packed asbestos with his bare hands, is one of five miners who recently began legal action against the British owned Cape Asbestos plc. Two of them have since died. Adams is dying of asbestos. His wife, parents and brothers all died as a result of an asbestos-related disease.

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The workplace has many hazards that cause a variety of afflictions - even if one's collar is white and one can hear the buzz of the aircon while observing, through a one-way window, how others are earning their bread with sweated brows.

By definition, a working hazard is any condition in the workplace which can cause illness or injury or which in any way impairs one's mental, physical and/or social well being.  Hazardous substances, such as dust or chemicals, can get into one's body through breathing, touching, eating or swallowing. The type of work one does may also affect you if not properly designed or which does not have the necessary engineering controls as protection.

While legislation has gone a long way to promote and maintain the physical, mental and social well-being of workers in all occupations, a new breed of little foxes have nevertheless entered into our lives.

Even your boss can be an occupational hazard (!)

In today's competitive and uncertain working environment, even your boss could be an occupational hazard. Stress and depression count amongst the main causes of mental health problems in the working place, according to the SA Federation for Mental Health. It not only impairs your functioning and well-being, but can also influence your family relationships.

Stiff neck muscles and back pain after a day in front of the computer are other examples of the new generation maladies. Western countries already spend millions of rands per annum in medical care and loss of production due to backaches.

To stay healthy in any workplace, it is necessary to remember that it doesn't matter whose pay roll you're on - you are working for yourself.  Modern office problems can be prevented by learning how to deal with stress, maintaining the correct posture or through ergonomic organisation of your work station.

Feng Shui
Or you can consider Feng Shui - a Chinese science cum art developed 5000 years ago to help man live in harmony with his environment, and gain health, wealth and happiness while doing so.

According to Feng Shui the appropriate reorganisation of your living and working spaces and the appropriate orientation of buildings enables one to utilise the natural energy of the world and the universe.  When Lillian Too, the world's best known writer on the subject, recently told a group of people in Sandton more about Feng Shui ­- at R150 a ticket - it was necessary to bring in more chairs. Don't forget, these are people with work and wealth – yet, in search of another blessedness.

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