02 April 2020
C Watson
[FYI request #12404 email]
Tēnā koe C Watson
Your Official Information Act request, reference: GOV-004118
Thank you for your request of 09 March 2020, asking for the following information under the Official
Information Act 1982 (the Act):
Please provide the number of scalds/burns victims caused by steam from kettle/jug.
Please provide per year and if work related or not.
Please provide average cost of treatment From 2014 onwards if possible.
Background
The data set available to ACC is reliant on the information provided on an ACC45 injury claim form,
which is completed when a person seeks treatment for their injury. There are multiple fields on the
ACC45 form, some fields are mandatory to complete, and others are not.
There is a free-text field ‘accident description’ on the form where a person can provide a brief
description of how their accident happened. This field is not mandatory to complete and not every client
does so. Also, when the field is completed there is considerable variation in the way accidents are
described.
The data below was extracted for claims where the key words “kettle” or “jug”, and “steam” were used
in the free-text field. Due to the limitations above, while largely representative of the claims received by
ACC, the data should not be considered a complete, definitive measure of the claims related to burn
accidents that ACC received during the period covered by this response.
Burn injuries have been identified by the presence of the keyword ‘burn’ in the injury code assigned to
the claim when registered with ACC.
Notes about the data
Provided in the following tables is the data you have requested. Please consider the following when
interpreting the data provided:
• The data contains only those claims accepted for cover;
• Claims that are managed by an accredited employer are not included;
• New claims are counted by the date they are lodged with ACC. A claim can be lodged
immediately after an injury or at a later date;
• Active claims are ones that generated a payment in the period. A claim can be active over many
years and appear more than once in the data. The count of Active claims includes new claims for
which a payment has been made in the period;
• Costs are for active claims and are GST exclusive;
• The costs provided are the cost to ACC of treatment, rehabilitation and entitlements, such as
weekly compensation. This excludes the cost of emergency treatment at public hospitals, as
treatment provided by Public Health Acute Services is bulk funded and costs are not allocated to
individual claims;
• The data was extracted on 20 March 2020 and may differ if re-run at a later date.
GOV-004118
Table 1: New claims, active claims and active costs for steam burn injuries related to a kettle or jug
Calendar year
New claims
Active claims
Active costs $
2014
190
179
25,114
2015
166
167
29,933
2016
182
179
29,605
2017
183
173
26,203
2018
163
164
27,502
2019
183
182
31,225
2020*
37
35
6,292
*Calendar year to 13 March
Table 2: New claims for steam burn injuries related to a kettle or jug work-related status
Calendar year
Work-related claims
Non-work-related claims
2014
8
182
2015
6
160
2016
8
174
2017
9
174
2018
12
151
2019
10
173
2020*
<4
..
*Calendar year to 13 March
ACC takes privacy seriously, and as such does not routinely disclose low value numbers related to claims.
Accordingly, some of the values in the tables only indicate that the number is less than 4 (denoted as
Accident Compensation Corporation
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GOV-004118
<4). In other instances, values are supressed and notated as double dots (..) to limit the potential for
particular individuals or matters specific to certain individuals from being identified.
Withholding in this way is necessary to protect the privacy of these individuals. This decision is made
under section 9(2)(a) of the Act. In doing so, we have considered the public interest in making the
information available and have determined that it does not outweigh the need to protect the privacy of
these persons.
How you can contact us
If you have any questions, you can email me at
[email address]. If you are not happy with this response, you have the right to make a complaint to the Ombudsman.
Information about how to do this is available at
www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or by phoning 0800
802 602.
Nāku iti noa, nā
Sasha Wood
Manager Official Information Act Services
Government Engagement & Support
Accident Compensation Corporation
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