Os atletas do lixo: subsídios para a Promoção de Saúde de coletores de resíduos sólidos urbanos de Patos de Minas (MG)

• Autor(a) principal: Silva, Luciana de Araújo Mendes
• Data de Publicação: 2008
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório do Centro Universitário Braz Cubas
• Texto Completo: https://repositorio.cruzeirodosul.edu.br/handle/123456789/848
• topic: Coletores de resíduos; Condições de trabalho; Promoção de saúde; CNPQ::CIENCIAS DA SAUDE::SAUDE COLETIVA::SAUDE PUBLICA

Health Promotion, as a conceptual and practical field establishes the relations between human health and sustainable development, which include workers health. Among workers categories, the urban garbage workers are considered, according to Brazilian laws, one of the unhealthiest. In the present descriptive study, we characterized garbage workers from Patos de Minas (MG, Brazil) through its social and economic profile, work and health conditions, as well as city garbage management. We applied semi-structured interviews to all the garbage workers and managers, with the aim to provide health promotion strategies in order to reduce inequities. The results showed that the team responsible by collecting the garbage was composed by 27 workers and the management team was composed by three individuals. All the garbage workers were male, with predominance of individuals aging from 20 to 29 years old, most of them married. Among them, there was a considerable rate of functional illiteracy and the salary income was low. They normally collect many types of domestic, commercial and industrial garbage. Most of them referred that there was no training about risks of work accidents, before or after being contracted for the job. They referred as the most common work accidents were cuts and perforations on hands and arms, and car accidents. They have no private health care and referred as most common diseases, dermatitis and pain in the back. The major problems cited during the work were the bad treatment, wrong way of garbage packing and all sort of inconvenient such as dusty, stinky and intense isolation. The garbage deposit is considered as ‘controlled’, because they borrow health services garbage separated deposits for; however, dangerous objects can be found mixed with other household waste. The resulting gases of decomposition are combusted in tubes and liberated to the atmosphere, and leachate is not treated, which can bring, in a long time, serious impact on the environment. The managers have been working on improvements of the garbage deposit; however there is no recycling or environmental education project in progress. Nevertheless, garbage workers are still under serious risks of work accident. Keywords: garbage workers, work condiction, health promotion