Manual handling behind 48,355 Victorian injury claims since 2021
24 Feb 2026•BlueSafe Team•Source: WorkSafe VIC
WorkSafe has accepted 48,355 claims for hazardous manual handling injuries since 2021, making it Victoria’s leading cause of workplace injuries. Registrations are open for workshops to help businesses identify hazards and apply risk controls.
More than 60 per cent of the hazardous manual handling injury claims involved musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), including sprains, strains, back injuries, soft tissue injuries, hernias and chronic pain.
WorkSafe Chief Health and Safety Officer Sam Jenkin said hazardous manual handling was a key priority in the regulator’s work to reduce injuries in high-risk industries.
“When people think of hazardous manual handling, they often picture heavy lifting, but it shows up in countless other ways across all types of workplaces,” Mr Jenkin said. “Anything that involves awkward postures, repetitive movement or sustained force can place excessive strain on the body and lead to serious injuries which are often debilitating over the long-term.”
Manufacturing and healthcare and social assistance accounted for almost 40 per cent of MSDs caused by manual handling over the past five years. In childcare, risks can arise from lifting children into and out of cots, playing at floor level and spending extended periods at a desk doing administrative work.
In food manufacturing, lifting and carrying, along with repetitive work such as labelling products and sealing bottle tops, can cause injuries when risks are not adequately controlled.
“On average, about 26 workers are injured as a result of hazardous manual handling every single day across Victoria and no sector is immune,” Mr Jenkin said. He said these injuries were largely preventable with the right systems, equipment and work setups.
WorkSafe’s Manual handling basics workshops offer practical tools and resources for identifying hazardous manual handling and putting appropriate risk controls in place. Registrations are now open for employers, managers and supervisors with OHS responsibilities in small and medium-sized businesses.
How Blue Safe can help: Our free WHS self-check can help you review your approach to workplace health and safety and identify areas that need closer attention. Take the free WHS self-check