The Canadian Labour Congress adopted the canary as the symbol of worker safety, because of its historic use to conform the presence of carbon monoxide in coal mines prior to worker entry.

A time to “Mourn the dead. Fight like hell for the living!”

March 31, 2025 • Health and Safety Articles • 4 minutes to read

March 31, 2025 Health and Safety Articles 4 minutes to read

April 28

By Dorothy Wigmore

What are you doing April 28?

Will you be talking about health and safety? Remembering friends who got sick or hurt, or even died, because of their job? Going to a march or rally? Hearing from injured workers and families whose loved ones died because of their job?

Cecelia Gilligan Leto will be doing all of them. The New Jersey Work Environment Council (NJWEC) project director retired the end of March. She’s still joining the annual New Jersey Workers’ Memorial Day rally and march in New Brunswick, co-sponsored by NJWEC, unions, New Labor, and social justice, climate justice, civil rights, and other groups. (See nationalcosh.org/WMW for details.)

It’s the long-standing annual occasion to recognize and honor people killed or harmed by their work, and to recommit to the struggle for healthy and safe jobs for all.

“Each year at the rally, I read the names of New Jersey workers who’ve died on the job,” Leto says. “It’s heartbreaking for me. Just imagine how their children and spouses feel.”

“In 2024, OSHA reported 32 private and public sector workers died at work in the state in 2023, and the year before, I read the names of 41 workers. Each year we commit to NOT ONE MORE DEATH!” she adds. “For me, it’s also quoting Mother Jones, to mourn for the dead and fight like hell for the living.”

Where did the day come from?

The brainchild of Canadians Colin Lambert and Ray Sentes, in about 1983 they took the idea of a “day of mourning” to the national health and safety committee of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), where Lambert was health and safety director.

As a former unionized miner, he and Sentes lamented the contrast between public events for police officers and fire fighters who have died on the job and nothing like that for miners and other workers who died on the job or because of their work. To change that, they suggested using May 1 as a special day to recognize workers killed and harmed by their jobs.

The committee endorsed the idea and delegates supported the proposal at their 1984 convention. CUPE representatives then took it to the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC), supported by local union resolutions.

The first Day of Mourning took place on April 28 at the CLC’s 1986 convention. CLC decision-makers chose that date because it was the anniversary of when Ontario lawmakers passed Canada’s first workers’ compensation law in 1914. After passing a resolution supporting the day to “mourn for the dead and fight for the living,” delegates took to the streets about it.

In the early days, CUPE pushed for innovative ways to use the day. To attract “broad public recognition [we adopted] a universal, unthreatening symbol of worker safety—the canary,” Lambert recalled in 2010. “The canary’s an appropriate symbol,” he said then. “It shows that today workers are the canaries—they are front-line protection for all of us.”

The bird soon became the symbol of the day across Canada. Other responses included monuments, plaques, public moments of silence, flags at half-mast, marches and rallies.

In 1991, the Canadian government recognized April 28 as the “Day of Mourning for Persons Killed or Injured in the Workplace.” Unions, governments and many employers, also honor the day. Proclamations are common.

Health and safety activists in the U.S. AFL-CIO—the federation of most American unions—heard about the Canadian event. In 1989, the federation adopted April 28 as Workers Memorial Day, this time commemorating when the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration opened its doors in 1971.

Every year now, the AFL-CIO’s health and safety department prepares a detailed report about the health and safety situation in the country as well as posters, stickers and talking points for activities around the country. (See resources.)

The National COSH Network, a bilingual federation of grassroots worker organizations, including NJWEC, built campaigns around the day. They provide tools to write reports, organize events and more. (See resources.) Arguing worker health and safety needs more attention, about 20 years ago it expanded the idea to a week of events around the 28th.

Now an international day

Elsewhere, the U.K. Hazards Campaign adopted the idea in 1992. There, it was known as Workers’ Memorial Day, a time to “Remember the Dead: Fight for the Living.” Unions followed the group’s lead, as did government health and safety agencies in 2000.

Largely thanks to Hazards, unions around the world picked up the idea. (See amazing posters at 28april.org.) Then in 2001 the tripartite International Labour Organization (union, government and employer representatives) adopted the 28th as the World Day for Safety and Health at Work.

The International Trade Union Congress (ITUC)—to which the AFL-CIO and CLC belong—calls it International Workers’ Memorial Day. With the Hazards Campaign, their 28april.org site provides multilingual materials, information about events around the world and maps showing their locations. (See resources.)

This year, the International Labour Organization (ILO) focuses on how digitalization and artificial intelligence (AI) affect workers’ safety and health. The ITUC includes that theme in their more general one: Occupational Health and Safety: A Fundamental Right At Work. (The ILO added the right in 2022. It is supposed to be followed by all ILO members, including the U.S.)

What can health and safety committees do?

Get inspiration from the resources for activities, themes (including the newish fundamental right), posters, etc., adapting them to local issues.
Find out what other NJEA locals are doing, perhaps joining them.
Get the district to recognize the day, with union input about a moment’s silence, flag lowering, discussions, etc.
Organize or join a union/community event about health and safety issues in your district and community, working with local organizations (e.g., New Labor, climate justice, human rights, environmental health, parents’ groups).

Dorothy Wigmore is a long-time health and safety specialist and WEC consultant. She has worked in Canada, the U.S. and Mozambique, focusing on prevention and worker participation to fix job-related hazards. Trained as an ergonomist and hygienist, she’s also a pioneer of body and workplace mapping.