Abstract

Since its independence in 1958, Tunisia never ceased confirming its political will to protect worker’s health by issuing successive and specific legislative and regulatory texts. However, the achievement of this objective didn’t really arise until 1978 thanks to the establishment of the training course for occupational medicine specialists at the faculty of medicine of Tunis, after benefiting from north-south cooperation programs particularly with France, Belgium and Canada. That’s how we have now 40 specialised instructors (Prof, MCA, AHU) distributed in four medical schools in Tunisia, 50 labour doctor inspectors, 60 labour medical advisors at the CNAM and 1000 occupational doctors in different companies. Furthermore, the country has a research facility specialised in industrial toxicology, an occupational health and safety institute and a national council for preventing professional hazards which gathers all contributors in the field of occupational health and safety.

As a consequence, occupational medicine in Tunisia got through its creation stage and is currently oriented towards promoting local and international cooperation in many fields, particularly in multilateral research and in enhancing specific axes of the specialty.