Worker drowns after falling from refinery jetty

(ANSA) - ROME, AUG 17 - A factory worker drowned after falling from an oil refinery jetty at Cagliari in Sardinia on Wednesday.
    The accident happened at the Saras refinery at Sarroch, just outside the Sardinian capital.
    The man, who worked for an external company, slipped and fell into the water.
    Police divers recovered the body.
    Medics could do nothing to revive the man.
    An autopsy has been ordered.
    It is the latest in a long string of workplace accident deaths in Italy.
    Four other workers died on the job in one recent week including one at the foreign ministry in Rome.
    The government has taken several steps to try to stem the tide of deaths but the spate, which grabbed public attention a year ago with the death of a 22-year-old mother of a five-year-old boy, Luana D'Orazio, in a textile mill accident near Prato on May 3, 2021, has continued unabated.
    The recent fatalities were the latest in a shocking wave of workplace accident deaths in Italy that saw 1,221 perish last year and which has spurred government action.
    Such deaths are a national tragedy, Justice Minister Marta Cartabia said on October 22.
    She said the government had intervened by increasing the number of inspectors and checks, but a new law on administrative responsibility would be even more useful in stopping the rash of fatalities.
    Premier Mario Draghi said on October 17 that workplace safety norms recently approved by the government sent the "unequivocal signal that you cannot save (money) at the expense of workers' lives" after the spate continued with four more deaths in one day.
    "As the government, we committed ourselves to doing everything possible to prevent these episodes happening again," Draghi said.
    "The norms are the realisation of this promise. We are increasing the numbers of workplace inspectors, we are stiffening sanctions, we are boosting computerization to improve checks." Despite this, as the deaths continued, Italy's big three trade-union confederations, CGIL, CISL and UIL, held a major demonstration in Rome in mid-December to demand further urgent action on health and safety to stem the tide of fatalities.
    Turin held a day of mourning on December 21 for three workers who died when a large crane collapsed in the northern city the previous weekend.
    Re-elected President Sergio Mattarella said in his inaugural address in February that such deaths must stop, while Pope Francis has also joined the chorus against the phenomenon.
    (ANSA).