Workplace exposures
Adequate control of harmful work exposures should be a universal priority. However, its execution varies widely across the world. These exposures can significantly impact workers’ health leading to disease and mortality. Our recent review on occupational exposures in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) explores the levels reported across different industries in different countries.
We searched available literature and identified the publications that reported measured exposure levels to occupational agents across multiple industries in LMICs.
What did we find?
Brief summary
We found a total of 58 publications reporting quantitative exposure levels between 1998 to 2022. The countries with greatest number of publications were China, followed by Iran and Tanzania. The most common industries were manufacturing, mining, and agriculture with factory workers and miners being the most common job titles.
Occupational exposures and their levels in this review
Why does this matter?
- High exposure, limited regulation: Workers in LMICs face high exposure to harmful agents like dust, gases, metals, and pesticides. Compared to high-income countries, regulatory frameworks in LMICs may be underdeveloped, contributing to health risks.
- Industries at risk: Manufacturing, mining, and agriculture dominate the studies reviewed, with factory workers and miners being the most common occupations. Emerging industries like e-waste recycling present emerging challenges, often in unregulated settings.
- Sex disparities: Most studies focused on male workers, and therefore little data is available on female-dominated sectors, like informal cottage industries, which remain under-researched despite high exposure risks.
- Important research needs: The review highlights uneven data availability across regions and industries. It emphasises the need for accurate report of exposure measurements that can contribute to tailored tools, such as job-exposure matrices, to better adapted to LMICs to assess and mitigate the risk of occupational exposures.
Take home message
Occupational exposures significantly contribute to global disease burdens, especially in LMICs where protective measures may be scarce. Addressing these gaps help to mitigate adverse health outcomes resulting from high exposure levels in working populations in developing countries.
The findings of this study were published in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS Global Public Health. The article can be freely accessed and read here: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgph.0003888Â