How Dangerous Is Pest Control Work? The Federal Data
Pest control workers are injured in roadway vehicle crashes at 34.7 cases per 10,000 full-time workers, 9.6 times the rate for all private-industry occupations, and four of the seven pest control workers killed on the job in 2024 died in transportation incidents. The truck is the hazard more than the chemicals. The federal handbook calls pest control work one of the highest-injury occupations, while industry-wide injury rates sit just below the private-sector average. Both are true, and the difference between them is the story.
Almost everything published on this subject is written for consumers asking whether a treatment is safe for their family. This page is about the people doing the work, measured in federal injury and fatality data, with the small-sample caveats stated rather than buried.
The industry looks safe. The job does not.
At industry level, pest control’s total recordable injury rate in 2024 was 2.2 cases per 100 full-time workers, against 2.3 for all private industry. That figure covers everyone employed by pest control firms, including office, sales and management staff, which dilutes the rate for those in the field.
At occupation level the picture reverses. Annualised across 2023 and 2024, pest control workers had 202.1 cases involving days away from work, restricted duty or transfer per 10,000 full-time workers, against 140.8 for all occupations. For cases involving days away from work specifically, the rate was 150.3 against 86.6, which is 74 per cent higher.
The industry rate also moves around a lot from year to year: 2.7 in 2021, 4.0 in 2022, 2.8 in 2023 and 2.2 in 2024. That is what a small, high-variance sample looks like, not a safety trend in either direction. Anyone quoting a single year as proof of improvement is over-reading it.
What actually hurts them
| Cause | Pest control workers | All occupations | Ratio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Roadway incidents, motor vehicles | 34.7 | 3.6 | 9.6 times |
| Contact with another person or animal | 15.3 | 3.1 | 4.9 times |
| Same-level slips, trips and falls | 52.8 | 22.5 | 2.3 times |
| Exposure to harmful substances or environments | 20.2 | 10.6 | 1.9 times |
| Falls to a lower level | 7.5 | 5.6 | 1.3 times |
| Overexertion and repetitive motion | 30.8 | 44.7 | 0.7 times |
Cases involving days away, restriction or transfer per 10,000 full-time workers, annualised 2023 to 2024.
Four findings stand out. Route-based work means a lot of driving, and vehicle crashes are the most over-represented hazard at nearly ten times the average rate. Contact with people and animals, which captures dog bites and stings, runs at almost five times the average. Same-level falls, not ladder falls, dominate the falls category. And overexertion is below average, which contradicts the crawl-space-strain framing that most career guides lead with.
There is no separate breakout for heat illness at this level of detail; it sits inside the harmful substances and environments category. There is no event code for confined or crawl-space incidents either.
Fatalities, and what the data will not tell you
Fatal injuries in pest control are, thankfully, few enough that federal statisticians suppress most of the detail. In 2024, 7 pest control workers died on the job, and the only cause published was transportation, accounting for 4. In 2023 there were 7 again, with falls, slips and trips the only published cause, at 3. Counting by industry rather than occupation gives 8 deaths in 2022, 8 in 2023 and 9 in 2024.
No federal fatality rate is published for pest control specifically. We can estimate one, and it should be labelled as ours: 9 industry deaths in 2024 against roughly 139,900 full-time-equivalent workers gives about 6.4 per 100,000, around double the national rate of 3.3. That estimate runs high, because the death count includes the self-employed while the hours denominator does not, and a single additional death would move it materially. Treat it as an order of magnitude, not a figure to quote to one decimal place.
Insects are not what kill exterminators
A federal analysis of fatal injuries involving insects between 2003 and 2010 found 83 deaths, mostly from bee and wasp stings, and the occupations most affected were farming, construction and landscaping. Pest control workers accounted for 3. The workers most exposed to stinging insects are, it turns out, the ones who expect them, carry protection and know to watch for anaphylaxis.
Chemicals and fumigation
No national dataset isolates structural pest control applicators within occupational pesticide illness. A federal surveillance summary covering 12 states from 2007 to 2011 recorded 2,606 acute occupational pesticide cases, with a rate in non-agricultural work of 0.5 per 100,000 full-time workers against 18.6 in agriculture. Michigan, which does break out pest control operators, has recorded 71 cases in that group since 2001, about three a year, and among contributing factors across all occupations lists inadequate ventilation before re-entry, early re-entry and missing or inadequate respirators.
Structural fumigation is where the worst outcomes concentrate, and most of its documented deaths have been residents and bystanders re-entering after clearance rather than applicators. The clearest recent worker case was in April 2023 in Pompano Beach, Florida, where two employees died after fumigating a furniture warehouse; the county medical examiner attributed one death to sulfuryl fluoride exposure, and the state ordered the company to halt fumigation. The chemistry and certification side of this is covered in restricted-use pesticides and tenting and fumigation.
What OSHA cites
Federal OSHA conducted 7 inspections in the industry in the 2025 fiscal year, producing 28 citations and $135,306 in penalties. Respiratory protection accounted for 8 of the 28 citations and $89,000 of the penalties, about two thirds. Hazard communication, permit-required confined spaces and air contaminants followed. That excludes the states running their own OSHA plans, so real volume is higher, but the point stands: this is an industry that is rarely inspected, and when it is, respirators are the recurring finding.
What an operator should take from it
- Treat the fleet as the primary safety programme. Vehicle crashes are the most over-represented injury cause and the leading published cause of death in 2024. Driver training, route planning and telematics address the largest measured risk. The insurance side of that is in pest control insurance.
- Put respiratory protection in writing. It is the most cited OSHA standard in the industry and the most expensive when it is cited.
- Plan for dogs and stinging insects on routes, since contact injuries run at almost five times the average.
- Do not rely on the industry rate to judge your own. Benchmark field staff against the occupation figures, which is where the risk actually sits.
For anyone considering the job itself, the career path is covered in how to become a pest control technician, and pay in technician pay by state.
How we did this
Injury rates come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses: Table 1 for industry incidence rates for NAICS 56171 and all private industry, and Tables R100 and R8 for case rates by event for the pest control worker occupation and the industry. Fatalities come from the Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, Tables A-1 and A-5. The fatality rate is our own estimate, derived from the fatality count and the hours worked reported in the injury survey, and is labelled as such. OSHA figures come from the agency’s cited-standard data for NAICS 561710, federal jurisdiction only.
Frequently asked questions
Is pest control a dangerous job?
For the people doing the field work, it is more dangerous than average. Pest control workers have 150.3 cases involving days away from work per 10,000 full-time workers against 86.6 for all occupations, and vehicle-crash injuries at 9.6 times the average rate. The industry-wide rate looks close to average only because office and sales staff dilute it.
What is the most common injury for pest control workers?
By rate, same-level slips, trips and falls are the most frequent single category at 52.8 cases per 10,000, but the most over-represented relative to other jobs is roadway vehicle crashes, at 34.7 against 3.6 for all occupations.
How many pest control workers die on the job each year?
Seven in 2024 and seven in 2023, counting by occupation; eight or nine a year counting by industry. In 2024 the only published cause was transportation, accounting for four. Federal data suppresses the detail on the rest because the numbers are small.
Is there a fatality rate for pest control?
The government does not publish one for this occupation. Our own estimate is about 6.4 deaths per 100,000 full-time workers, roughly double the national rate of 3.3, but it is biased high by how the underlying data is compiled and is sensitive to a single death, so it should be read as an order of magnitude.
Do pesticides injure pest control workers?
Less often than people assume. Non-agricultural occupational pesticide illness ran at 0.5 per 100,000 full-time workers in federal surveillance data, and Michigan records about three cases a year among pest control operators. Fumigation is the exception where serious incidents concentrate.
What does OSHA cite pest control companies for?
Respiratory protection above all. In the 2025 fiscal year it accounted for 8 of 28 federal citations in the industry and about two thirds of the $135,306 in penalties, followed by hazard communication, confined spaces and air contaminants.
Do stinging insects kill pest control workers?
Rarely. A federal study of insect-related work deaths from 2003 to 2010 found 83, mostly among farm, construction and landscaping workers. Pest control workers accounted for 3, likely because they expect stinging insects and prepare for them.
Sources
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses, Table 1, industry injury and illness rates, 2024. bls.gov
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics, case and demographic tables R8 and R100, annualised 2023 to 2024. bls.gov
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, Tables A-1 and A-5. bls.gov
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Beyond the Numbers, fatal and nonfatal injuries involving insects, arachnids and mites, August 2014. bls.gov
- CDC, Acute Occupational Pesticide-Related Illness and Injury, United States, 2007 to 2011. MMWR 63(55). cdc.gov
- Michigan State University, Pesticide Illness and Injury Surveillance in Michigan, 2023. oem.msu.edu
- US Occupational Safety and Health Administration, frequently cited standards, NAICS 561710. osha.gov
