A new state-of-the-art facility intended to advance workplace safety has opened at Fanshawe College. “Two years ago, this was a dream,” said Jeff Lang, Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) President and CEO. “Now it’s a real space that will change lives, and save lives too, especially for our first responders.” The WSIB Centre of Excellence in Immersive Technologies Simulation for Workplace Safety is a facility which will use extended reality (XR) and artificial intelligence (AI) to develop immersive training and therapeutic simulations to help public safety personnel prepare for high-pressure scenarios, strengthen decision-making skills, and support recovery and return-to-work outcomes after a mental stress injury. “It’s a critical problem that first responders are facing, especially in policing,” said Chief Thai Truong of the London Police Service. “This partnership means a great deal. It’s about protecting the officers, getting them ready to come back and having it backed by research. This partnership is not just about the officers that are currently suffering right now, but it’s actually preparing the future.” Driven by a transformational invest of $20 million in 2024 from the WSIB, this facility will develop innovative training and therapeutic simulations designed to address some of the most pressing challenges facing the public safety sector today. “First responders pay a heavy psychological price for everything they see in the line of duty. I see that price every day in the data,” said Lang. “Mental stress claims are the fastest growing types of claims that we deal with at the WSIB and mental stress injuries among first responders is a key driver in that growth, and the numbers are not slowing down. But that’s the volume story. Then there’s the story of pain, the psychological struggle that each of our heroes deal with every single day.” Lang continued, “The impact to their families, their friendships, their coworkers. And when that pain becomes so intense, so unmanageable and overwhelming that that person decides to take their life. Even if that happens once, it’s once too much, once too many. No one should ever have to pay that price to respond to keep our communities safe. And quite frankly, neither should their loved ones, their coworkers, nor their communities.”
