And we at OSHA rededicate ourselves to our mission of preventing those tragedies. Since OSHA was created 27 years ago, workplace fatalities have been cut in half. That's good news. Yet last year, more than 6,100 workers died in the workplace. Even one life lost is too many.
Homicide is the number one cause of death for women on the job.
Many of you in this room have helped in this effort. And we'll be introducing a number of people later. Although workplace murders declined somewhat in 1996, they still represented 15 percent of all deaths. That's more than 900 workers who went to work but never came home. And 80 percent of them died at the hands of robbers or other criminals.