Skip to main content

Table 4 Age and employment characteristics of miners recorded on the TEBA database, 1973–2012

From: Public health implications of changing patterns of recruitment into the South African mining industry, 1973–2012: a database analysis

Characteristic

Median

Mean

Interquartile range

1st- 99th percentile

Na

Age at entry (yrs)

25

27.9

22–32

17–56

1,625,053

No. of contracts

4

6.3

1–9

1–26

1,625,053

Length of first contract (days)

365

669

350–429

8–5917

1,624,372

Length of returning contract (days)

365

448

357–392

8–3249

8,676,738

Cumulative employment – days (yrs)

2291 (6.3)

3062 (8.4)

732–4412 (2.0–12.1)

8 - 11,674 (0.02–40.0)

1,624,981

Average cumulative service by commodity – days (yrs)b

 Gold

2359 (6.5)

3093 (8.4)

755 to 4450 (2.1–12.2)

8 - 11,787 (0.02–32.3)

1,223,152

 Platinum

1095 (3)

1787 (4.9)

367–2526 (1.0–6.9)

8–9013 (0.02–24.7)

392,806

 Coal

1720 (4.7)

2441 (6.7)

366 to 3205 (1.0–8.8)

1 to 10,578 (0–29.0)

60,833

 Other

374 (1.0)

838 (2.3)

365–911 (1.0–2.5)

0–5989 (0.02–16.4)

178,426

  1. aVariation in totals due to exclusion of contracts with erroneous data, mainly termination date occurring before registration date. (Additional file 1 Supplementary note 1)
  2. bAll service days included here, irrespective of whether the miner worked in one or multiple sectors