The UAE has announced the ‘Drop It Campaign’ to raise awareness on the importance of conserving water and re-using plastic bottles to decrease plastic pollution.
Plastic pollution in the UAE is one of the greatest burdens on the environment.
The region has one of the highest rates of bottled water consumption in the world with each resident drinking on average of 250 liters of bottled water a year.
The environmental organization Goumbook, announced through their ‘Drop It Campaign’ that bottled water is not only harming the environment, it could also be harmful to your health.
Goumbook’s aim is to encourage the public and businesses to switch to drinking filtered tap water in reusable containers.
Antonelli Abella, the co-founder of Goumbook, stated;
“The amount of chemicals that are extracted into water from being in plastic that is exposed to movement and heat and is known to cause health problems.”
The chemical released in plastic bottles is called bisphenol A (BPA) and recently the Food and Drug Administration in the US has banned this chemical in baby bottles.
Ms. Antonelli Abella emphasized that if the public is not concerned with said health risks of BPA then maybe the environmental effects the plastic is having should change people's minds.
The UAE has a significant climate and is susceptible to extreme weather, such as heat waves during the summer months and also sandstorms.
These sandstorms can have severe health effects on people suffering from asthma and being aware of how to live with asthma during adverse weather and sandstorms is vital for respiratory health and good quality of life.
Regional Medical Director, Mohamed Samir, shares six Health & Safety tips on how to survive sandstorms in the region this season:
With the majority of the region fasting for Ramadan, tempers are more likely to rise, so road safety has been highlighted as a particular area of concern during this time.
According to road safety experts, traffic accidents and fatalities increase during the month of Ramadan.
Ramadan is a very special time. For 1.2 million Muslims, the holy month of Ramadan started on Monday 6th June. This is a time marked by prayer, dawn-till-dusk fasting, and good deeds.
Believed to be the anniversary of Prophet Muhammed revealing the first verses of the Quran, 1,400 years ago; each day of the month for the 30-day religious period, Muslims avoid eating, drinking, and smoking from sunrise to sunset to focus on spirituality and remind them of those less fortunate.
The psychological phenomenon is a potential cause of driving accidents.
“One of the key perceptual errors that contribute to accidents on the road is ‘looking but failing to see’.”
(Elsevier Ltd, 2008)
Psychological studies question the reliability of blaming poor attention to the occurrence of driving incidents. Instead, the ‘change blindness’ phenomenon has become considered as a likely cause.
The HSE defines a Near Miss as:
“an event not causing harm, but has the potential to cause injury or ill health.”
A near miss can happen anywhere; inside, outside, or on the road. It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, if an accident or incident almost happened, it’s classed as a near miss.
Near misses happen in the workplace every day. You can either brush them aside and credit good luck, or you can take them as valuable warnings of issues to be addressed. If the same type of near misses happens, again and again, the odds are someone will eventually get hurt.
By paying attention to near-misses and tracking them correctly it should help lower your chances of serious injuries occurring. For every near miss that is not investigated or reported, it’s more likely there will be an accident.
There’s no doubt that health and safety can save lives and businesses, but many people think that overzealous rules can be a bit of a step too far.
Many people are so worried about breaking the rules because of a lack of health and safety training that they will impose strange rules that can appear to be wrapping things up in cotton wool.
To evidence that here are 6 of the strangest bans from the world of health and safety over the years.
Joe and Izzy couldn’t wait for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. They’d been planning what they were going to get for weeks. It was going to be the perfect start to the Christmas period and their next bonanza!
It was simple to design their best online targets – to be the first to the gifts awaiting them. Sadly, for many people, Joe and Izzy were going to ruin their own plans. They were part of a well-organised criminal gang who were planning multiple cyber-attacks targeting the public at a time when many of us are more vulnerable than usual by chasing the ‘best online deal around’.
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In these uncertain times, businesses across the UK and around the world are experiencing a new normal, presenting for some a range of different challenges, including having to adjust how you keep people motivated, engaged and ensure positive continuous communication.
This final blog in our anti-money laundering series focuses on the risks money laundering reporting officers can face from fulfilling their crucial roles.
Any UK business that falls within the regulated sector must appoint a ‘nominated officer’, which is a person who is assigned to receive disclosures under Part 3 (terrorist property) of the Terrorism Act 2000 or Part 7 (money laundering) of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. Such a person is commonly known as a money laundering reporting officer (MLRO).
In this blog, we look at some of the fines imposed on financial institutions for active involvement in money laundering and whether such fines act as an effective deterrent to those thinking of engaging in money laundering activity. We also explore the fines levied for not employing effective anti-money laundering systems and processes.
