Promoting international collaboration throughthe International Commission on Occupational Health

As a leading international organization of occupational health professionals, the International Commission on Occupational Health, known by its acronym ICOH in English or CIST in French, is fully committed to promoting international collaboration in the field of occupational health. Founded in 1906, ICOH continues its longstanding work, with the main emphasis on fostering the scientific progress, knowledge and development of occupational health, as stated in its Constitution. This work is further strengthened by keeping close liaison with international allies and the scientific media, including this journal. It is encouraging that there is internationally a common understanding about the emphasis to be placed in protecting and promoting the health of workers. Awareness is shared concerning a strong need to reduce incidences of occupational injuries and diseases in all the industrial sectors and to fill gaps in providing occupational health services in different employment situations. To meet these challenges, international collaboration is growing towards two main directions, i.e., developing proactive risk management procedures and extending occupational health services to all workplaces. The two directions are incorporated as two major areas of ICOH action plans for the triennium 2012–2015. ICOH is an association of about 2,000 individual occupational health professionals and practitioners. Based on this unique setup , international collaboration is undertaken by the initiative of its members in varied key positions and 35 Scientific Committees. There are about 60 National/Area Secretaries designated for enhancing collaboration of the members. Each member can join three Scientific Committees. Thus the members in each country/ area and the Scientific Committees constitute two pillars of the ICOH activities. The impact of ICOH activities is visible by the recent developments in advancing strategic prevention of occupational diseases, with due attention to complex health-related dynamics. Examples include the recent revision leading to the ILO List of Occupational Diseases (2010) and the concerted effort towards the global ban of asbestos. The need for the strategic prevention of occupational diseases is well reflected in the new ILO List of Occupational Diseases. ICOH was involved in the expert meetings formulating the revised list. The range of internationally recognized occupational diseases has expanded, including illnesses caused by chemical, physical and biological agents, respiratory and skin diseases, muscu-loskeletal disorders and occupational cancer. Mental and behavioural disorders have for the first time been specifically included. The list has open items in all the sections allowing the recognition of the occupational origin of diseases not specified …