Occupational exposure to chrysotile in an asbestos cement factory in Kyrgyzstan.

IF 1.8 4区医学 Q3 PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH Annals Of Work Exposures and Health Pub Date : 2024-07-17 DOI:10.1093/annweh/wxae059

Zhyldyz Kurzhunbaeva, Andrea Spinazzè, Davide Campagnolo, Sabrina Rovelli, Giacomo Fanti, Omor Kasymov, Andrea Cattaneo, Claudio Colosio, Domenico M Cavallo

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Abstract

Objectives: An increasing number of countries are banning the production and use of asbestos, in compliance with the ratification of the C162 Asbestos Convention and the Basel Convention, and in response to the call for its elimination in the ILO resolution and WHO reports on the health risks associated with asbestos. Nevertheless, several countries, including Kyrgyzstan, are still miners and/or manufacturers of asbestos. The main objective of the study is to assess the occupational exposure to chrysotile of workers engaged in a production facility of asbestos-cement products in Kyrgyzstan.

Methods: Monitored workers (n = 16, for a total of n = 18 samples) were divided into 3 "Similar Exposure Groups" (SEGs; SEG-1: asbestos loading; SEG-2; asbestos-cement mixing; SEG-3: cutting of asbestos-cement sheets) according to EN 689 standard. Samples were collected through personal sampling and subsequently examined by means of scanning electron microscope equipped with an energy-dispersive spectrometer for the compositional analysis of each fibre. The numerical concentration of airborne asbestos fibres was henceforward determined by dividing the number of fibres and the volume of sampled air (expressed in the number of fibres per millilitre of air: ff/ml).

Results: Investigated workers resulted to be exposed to chrysotile fibres. Results (GM ± GSD) outlined extremely high exposure levels for SEG-1 (2.2 ± 2.1 ff/ml) and SEG-3 (4.7 ± 1.6 ff/ml) workers and lower-but still relevant-exposure values for SEG-2 (0.91 ± 2.6 ff/ml) workers.

Conclusions: The results obtained in this case study can help to document potentially critical situations of occupational exposure to asbestos that can still occur nowadays in low and middle-income countries where asbestos is still mined and processed.

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吉尔吉斯斯坦一家石棉水泥厂的温石棉职业暴露。

目标：越来越多的国家正在禁止生产和使用石棉，以遵守 C162 号《石棉公约》和《巴塞尔公约》的批准，并响应国际劳工组织决议和世界卫生组织关于石棉对健康危害的报告中提出的消除石棉的呼吁。然而，包括吉尔吉斯斯坦在内的一些国家仍然是石棉的开采国和/或生产国。本研究的主要目的是评估吉尔吉斯斯坦一家石棉水泥制品生产厂的工人接触温石棉的职业情况：根据 EN 689 标准，受监测的工人（n = 16，共 n = 18 个样本）被分为 3 个 "类似接触组"（SEGs；SEG-1：石棉装载；SEG-2：石棉-水泥混合；SEG-3：石棉-水泥板切割）。通过个人取样收集样本，然后用配备能量色散光谱仪的扫描电子显微镜对每种纤维进行成分分析。空气中石棉纤维的数值浓度是用纤维数量除以采样空气的体积（以每毫升空气中的纤维数量表示：ff/ml）得出的：结果：接受调查的工人暴露于温石棉纤维。结果（GM ± GSD）显示，SEG-1（2.2 ± 2.1 ff/ml）和 SEG-3（4.7 ± 1.6 ff/ml）工人的接触水平极高，SEG-2（0.91 ± 2.6 ff/ml）工人的接触值较低，但仍具有相关性：本案例研究获得的结果有助于记录中低收入国家目前仍在开采和加工石棉时可能出现的石棉职业暴露危急情况。

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来源期刊

Annals Of Work Exposures and Health Medicine-Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health

CiteScore

4.60

自引率

19.20%

发文量

期刊介绍： About the Journal Annals of Work Exposures and Health is dedicated to presenting advances in exposure science supporting the recognition, quantification, and control of exposures at work, and epidemiological studies on their effects on human health and well-being. A key question we apply to submission is, "Is this paper going to help readers better understand, quantify, and control conditions at work that adversely or positively affect health and well-being?" We are interested in high quality scientific research addressing: the quantification of work exposures, including chemical, biological, physical, biomechanical, and psychosocial, and the elements of work organization giving rise to such exposures; the relationship between these exposures and the acute and chronic health consequences for those exposed and their families and communities; populations at special risk of work-related exposures including women, under-represented minorities, immigrants, and other vulnerable groups such as temporary, contingent and informal sector workers; the effectiveness of interventions addressing exposure and risk including production technologies, work process engineering, and personal protective systems; policies and management approaches to reduce risk and improve health and well-being among workers, their families or communities; methodologies and mechanisms that underlie the quantification and/or control of exposure and risk. There is heavy pressure on space in the journal, and the above interests mean that we do not usually publish papers that simply report local conditions without generalizable results. We are also unlikely to publish reports on human health and well-being without information on the work exposure characteristics giving rise to the effects. We particularly welcome contributions from scientists based in, or addressing conditions in, developing economies that fall within the above scope.