Contrary to the perception that the home is a safe environment, a person is ten times more likely to sustain a serious injury or die at home as a result of an accident than in the course of their employment. This book will help homeowners combat those odds by providing information adapted from proven techniques used by safety professionals. Filled with ancedotal descriptions and examples, the book offers much more than “safety tips” as it educates the homeowner in how to control risk through hazard identification. Information is concisely organized, uniformly formatted, and supported by high quality images. Chapter topics include fall hazards (roofs, ladders, stairs, etc.), electrical safety, fire prevention, hand and power tool safety, emergency planning, and others. Added value can be found in the self-inspection forms or “cheat-sheets” located at the end of each chapter that the reader can copy to complete their own home safety audit. A collection of simple usable safety techniques directed specifically to homeowners like this does not currently exist. The target audience is the general public with sales offered through book retail stores, building material suppliers (i.e. Home Depot) and possibly homeowner insurance companies. Chapter sponsorship opportunities are being pursued through featured products, i.e. “This chapter on ladder safety brought to you by Werner Ladders,” “This chapter on power tool safety brought to you by DeWalt,” etc., and supporting product imagery for these chapters would feature those manufacturers’ products. There is a statistical gap between what we think we know and what we actually know about home safety. Home safety accidents disable more than 12 million people in the home every year and are the fifth leading cause of death. Forty-five percent of all unintentional deaths occur in and around the home environment, claiming the lives of children, aging parents, spouses, partners, and friends making the home environment one of the most hazardous environments we inhabit. But how can we expect to protect ourselves and the ones we love if we aren't even aware there is a problem? Hannan says 75% of all unintentional injuries and deaths in the home hinge on our behavior, more specifically, on the decisions we make. And the first and most important home safety decision we should make is to improve our hazard recognition skills and become more safety conscious. Homeowner's can't rely on product recalls or state and federal agencies to keep them and their loved ones safe in the home. Unlike other safety campaigns seen in our communities, the policing and protection of our home environment depends entirely on the homeowner. This book offers simple techniques to raise home-safety awareness and improve our abilities to recognize hazards, correct hazards and prevent unintentional accidents from occurring in the home. Each chapter of has high quality images to illustrate safety procedures; identifies problems and hazards in the home; recommends safety practices to assist homeowners in identifying hazards; gives action items for proactive prevention of accidents; has a safety inspection checklist allowing homeowners to be thorough and organized in their approach to home safety; and lists a reference section providing links and other resources for additional related safety information.

Improved housing conditions can save lives, prevent disease, increase quality of life, reduce poverty, and help mitigate climate change. Housing is becoming increasingly important to health in light of urban growth, ageing populations and climate change. The WHO Housing and health guidelines bring together the most recent evidence to provide practical recommendations to reduce the health burden due to unsafe and substandard housing. Based on newly commissioned systematic reviews, the guidelines provide recommendations relevant to inadequate living space (crowding), low and high indoor temperatures, injury hazards in the home, and accessibility of housing for people with functional impairments. In addition, the guidelines identify and summarize existing WHO guidelines and recommendations related to housing, with respect to water quality, air quality, neighbourhood noise, asbestos, lead, tobacco smoke and radon. The guidelines take a comprehensive, intersectoral perspective on the issue of housing and health and highlight co-benefits of interventions addressing several risk factors at the same time. The WHO Housing and health guidelines aim at informing housing policies and regulations at the national, regional and local level and are further relevant in the daily activities of implementing actors who are directly involved in the construction, maintenance and demolition of housing in ways that influence human health and safety. The guidelines therefore emphasize the importance of collaboration between the health and other sectors and joint efforts across all government levels to promote healthy housing. The guidelines' implementation at country-level will in particular contribute to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals on health (SDG 3) and sustainable cities (SDG 11). WHO will support Member States in adapting the guidelines to national contexts and priorities to ensure safe and healthy housing for all.