4 Health-Hazard Situations That Require You to Seek Professional Legal Assistance
Health-hazard situations are more common than you think, and many of them require legal attention. This article discusses four health-hazard situations that you might encounter at some point in your life, whether it’s at home or at the office.
Slip and fall injury
The most common cause of injuries in the US, slip and fall accidents account for 10 million emergency room visits every year. If you can prove that there were dangerous conditions on the property that led you to get injured in a slip and fall or trip and fall accident, the negligent property owner may have to pay for medical expenses, pain, and suffering damages. If the dangerous condition was caused by a business invitee (someone who is invited onto your property) or licensee (someone who is not invited but you don’t charge them like a solicitor), they cannot be held liable under ordinary negligence law (if no one had been on their property at all, then yes).
They will only be liable if they breached their duty by failing to keep their premises safe and this breach of duty was the proximate cause of the accident. To prove this, you will need to show that the dangerous condition was present for a sufficient length of time before your accident occurred and that it presented enough danger to warrant removing customers or licensees. If no one had been on the premises then the property owner may not be held liable under ordinary negligence law.
Chemical waste injury
The most common health hazard that requires legal aid is chemical injury. There are many substances that can potentially cause injury or harm to the human body, including household cleaners, pesticides, chemicals used in manufacturing, and even some pharmaceutical drugs. If you find yourself or a loved one suffering from an acute chemical injury, seek legal help immediately- not only will medical bills pile up quickly after such an incident but so can potential lawsuits against your employer or others who may be liable for how that chemical came into contact with you.
Generally speaking, there is no need for hiring private counsel in cases of injuries caused by chemicals when it is clearly someone else’s fault (e.g., they were careless when using the product) because governmental agencies like the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will take up your case and often offer legal help for free. However, it is important to note that if you or a loved one was injured by chemicals after following safety procedures given to you by those very same governmental agencies, then it may be in your best interests to seek private counsel as these agencies typically do not provide much legal aid in such cases.
Workplace injury
Another very common reason you might need to seek private legal help is if you suffer a workplace injury. Of course, the most common cases of workplace-related injuries involve manual labor (i.e., construction), but any job that causes repetitive stress or even includes dangerous machinery can also result in an injury. Roughly 7 out of every 1000 workers per year are killed on the job in the United States, with roughly half of these deaths being related to construction accidents. While it is not always easy to prove liability in construction accident cases, if you find yourself the victim of a construction accident, legal counsel could help you recover damages that may be owed to you by site owners or contractors if they are found guilty of negligence.
Injuries that occur on the job are covered by workers’ compensation insurance. Benefits typically include medical expenses related to recovery from work-related injuries as well as payment for time missed due to injury from work. However, if your employer fails to provide adequate safety equipment or fails to educate its employees about the potential dangers of a particular process or task, you may have a workers’ compensation claim. Workers’ compensation law is complex, and an experienced attorney can help ease the process of obtaining the benefits you need to recover from your injury.
Defective products
When a product causes damage because it was defective, victims may be able to seek legal recourse by filing a suit against its manufacturer or seller. A personal injury lawyer can help determine whether the product that caused your injuries was indeed defective and determine whether or not there is sufficient evidence against its manufacturer or seller to warrant filing a product liability suit.
There are cases when health-hazardous situations happen in the workplace or your daily life, and you need to seek professional legal assistance in order to deal with these situations. This is because there are several laws that cover work-related accidents, and agencies that handle health hazard incidents. If you are in doubt regarding claims or legal actions to take, it can be advantageous for you to seek legal assistance and let a lawyer handle the situation.
