The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has released its Health and Safety at Work: Summary Statistics for Great Britain 2025, and this year’s data tells a clear story: work-related ill health, especially stress, is rising sharply, while some traditional injury indicators continue to stabilise or slightly improve.

For health and safety leaders, HR teams, and business executives, the message is unmistakable.

The UK is facing a worsening mental health and wellbeing crisis at work and organisations must act decisively to manage psychosocial risk. Below is a breakdown of the most significant shifts from the 2024 to the 2025 dataset, and what they mean for organisational strategy.

Fatalities down — But this is no time for complacency

Workers killed: 2024: 138 → 2025: 125 (-13 deaths, -9%)

The long-term fatality trend remains broadly flat, but the reduction this year is welcome. It suggests that sustained investment in high-risk sectors, regulatory pressure and improved safety culture continues to make a difference. However, fatalities remain stubbornly above pre-COVID levels, and high-hazard industries still carry disproportionate risk.

Non-fatal workplace injuries – A mixed picture

Injuries reported via the Labour Force Survey (LFS): (2024) 604,000 → (2025) 680,000 (+76,000 / +13%)

This is a concerning increase and it contrasts sharply with RIDDOR-reportable injuries.

RIDDOR-reported injuries: (2024) 61,663 → (2025) 59,219 (-2,444 / -4%)

This divergence raises important questions:

• Are employers under-reporting?
• Are minor injuries increasing while major injuries remain stable?
• Or are workers more likely to self-report than employers are to formally report?

Severity split

• Over 7-day injuries: –2%
• Up to 7-day injuries: +80,000 (+17%)

This tells us the growth is in short-duration, lower-severity injuries, often linked to slips, trips, manual handling, and new hybrid work patterns.

Incident causes: Largely stable except for violence

Most common incident categories stayed consistent year-on-year, except:

Acts of violence: (2024) 9% → (2025) 10% (+11%)

This continues the UK-wide trend of increased aggression toward workers in public-facing roles, including retail, healthcare, and local government. For these sectors, violence prevention must be treated as a priority risk, not an emerging one.

Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSDs): Overall reduction, but not across all areas

Total MSD cases (new or long-standing): (2024) 543,000 → (2025) 511,000 (-32,000 / -6%)

Good news overall, but the detail matters.

Where MSD cases dropped:

• Lower limb MSDs: –28%
• Back MSDs: –5%

Where MSDs increased:

• Upper limb/neck MSDs: +4%
• New MSD cases overall: +3%
• Working days lost: –700,000 (-9%)

This reflects ongoing ergonomic challenges in remote/hybrid work settings: upper limb and neck issues are rising as poor home workstation set-ups persist.

As organisations prepare for long-term hybrid working, ergonomic risk management must be proactive, not reactive.

Work-Related Ill Health: A significant worsening across the board

• Total work-related ill health (new or long-standing): (2024) 1.7 million → (2025) 1.9 million (+200,000 / +12%)
• New cases of ill health: (2024) 609,000 → (2025) 730,000 (+121,000 / +20%)
• Working days lost to ill health: (2024) 29.6 million → (2025) 35.7 million (+6.1 million / +21%)

This is a major deterioration, and it represents a severe economic and operational impact. The biggest driver? Stress, depression and anxiety.

Stress, Depression & Anxiety: The Most Concerning Trend of 2025

• Total cases (new & existing): (2024) 776,000 → (2025) 964,000 (+188,000 / +24%)
• New cases: (2024) 300,000 → (2025) 409,000 (+109,000 / +36%)
• Working days lost: (2024) 16.4 million → (2025) 22.1 million (+5.7 million / +35%)

This sharp and sustained rise is the defining challenge for employers in 2025. The numbers show:

• More people are becoming ill due to stress at work.
• More existing cases are not recovering.
• The organisational impact is increasingly severe.

Drivers likely include:

• Workload pressure
• Understaffing
• Cost-of-living impacts
• Leadership and culture issues
• Increasing client/customer aggression
• The ongoing strain of hybrid working without proper job design

What these numbers mean for UK organisations in 2025

• Psychosocial risk must be treated as a core health & safety hazard. It is now the biggest cause of lost productivity, absence and long-term harm.
• Employers should prepare for increased regulatory focus. The HSE’s 2023 guidance on “Managing Stress and Mental Health at Work” is likely to be followed by further enforcement activity.
• Integrated wellbeing, HR, and health & safety strategies are essential. Stress is no longer just a wellbeing issue, it is an OH&S compliance issue.
• Ergonomics must be modernised for hybrid work – Upper limb and neck MSD increases show that home-working risk is far from under control.
• Violence and aggression must be managed as workplace hazards. Particularly for health, retail, education, and public administration.

The bottom line

The 2025 HSE statistics paint a very clear picture:

The UK is experiencing a significant rise in work-related ill health, dominated by mental health conditions, while injury patterns remain relatively stable.

For organisations, this means the health and safety landscape is shifting from acute physical harm to chronic psychosocial harm. Leaders must evolve their systems, training, and culture to protect workers in a rapidly changing environment.

We’re here to help

If you have any questions about our interpretation of the latest HSE statistics, or if you would like to explore how we can help you ensure your employees are provided with a safe, healthy and productive workplace, our team is here to support you. Contact us today.