On this date in 1789, Parisians stormed the notorious Bastille fortress and liberated the political prisoners inside. It was the unofficial start of the French Revolution and is still celebrated across France today. In recognition of Bastille Day, I set out to profile the state of occupational health and safety regulation in France. But finding information about the French OSHA system proved unexpectedly and frustratingly difficult. So instead of the overview I had hoped to present, here are some interesting tidbits about the workplace health and safety inspection system in France:

• France is among the few European countries that follow the North American OHS model of having a dedicated body of workplace health and safety inspectors. Most other countries rely on overlapping agencies to carry out these functions.
• In addition to health and safety, French workplaces are subject to inspection under the social security system for other work-related risks. Germany and Switzerland follow the same basic approach.
• Certain industries in France, such as the transit industry, are subject to separate inspections by specialized inspectors.
• As in North America and most other European countries, environmental inspections are carried out under a separate system.
• Although inspection ratios in all of Europe are disturbingly low, France’s ratio of less than 100 inspections per one million workers ranks with Germany, Belgium, Spain, Hungary, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Portugal, Malta and Luxembourg as the continent’s lowest. The countries with the highest inspection ratios (over 200 inspections per one million workers) are Denmark, Finland, Italy and Greece.

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