Many of the industrialized countries have trained sufficient numbers of occupational medical experts to provide one physician per 2 000 to 3 000 workers and about one nurse per 1 000 to 2 000 workers (with a wide range of variation). Many European countries and those of North America, as well as Australia and Japan, have established specialist or diploma curricula for occupational health, and some countries require specialization or diploma as a condition for the right to carry out occupational health practices. Special training in occupational health is available for nurses in most countries.

The training of specialists other than the medical experts for the multidisciplinary occupational health team is much less systematically organized in most other countries. Special curricula for occupational hygiene are available in six European countries and in the United States and Canada. WHO has defined the profile of an occupational hygienist on the basis of defined areas of knowledge in an effort to promote international harmonization of training curricula. Training of physiotherapists specialized in occupational health is also available in some countries while the special training of occupational psychologists is rare. For many Western European countries, the training of safety engineers is well organized. There is a universal shortage of both expert resources and training in developing and newly industrialized countries.

Equally important is the awareness and knowledge of managers, foremen, and union stewards of the key principles of occupational health, because they make decisions about several aspects of work that determine health and safety. The awareness, knowledge and skills of workers and the self-employed are key factors for appropriate safety and health behaviour and for adopting safe working practices. There is a universal need for training in the basic principles of occupational health and safety for workers who need such knowledge in their everyday work and employers who decide on the organization of work and other working conditions. In such guidance the need for a multidisciplinary approach should be specially addressed.

WHO’s Occupational Health Programme collaborates with scientific communities, other international bodies such as ILO, ICOH, IOHA and International Ergonomics Association (IEA), and the Network of WHO Collaborating Centres in Occupational Health to prepare appropriate guidelines for training curricula for the key expert groups in occupational health. Where individual countries are not able to carry out appropriate training programmes at the national level, WHO takes steps to establish through Regional Offices regional and sub-regional training programmes for training and education of experts in occupational health. The Network of Collaborating Centres in Occupational Health and, when appropriate, the special programmes such as Global Environmental Epidemiology Network (GEENET) and Global Occupational Health Network (GOHNET) are utilized. Countries with well-established training capacities in occupational health are encouraged to provide expert advice and support in the organization of such training programmes sub-regionally or bilaterally.

It is necessary that each country includes in its National Programme on Occupational Health an element of training of sufficient numbers of experts to implement the National Programme and to ensure sufficient personnel resources for OHS. All the necessary elements of occupational health should be included in the basic training curricula of all who may in the future deal with occupational health issues. Training in occupational health is also needed in vocational training and in training programmes for workers, employers and managers. In all training, the need for a multidisciplinary approach in occupational health should be emphasised to ensure the involvement of all relevant fields, including occupational medicine and nursing, occupational hygiene, ergonomics and work physiology, occupational safety and others.