Abstract
Lack of awareness of handling, spraying and disposal of pesticides could create adverse health effects in human beings. This study was conducted in selected villages of a rural district of Himachal Pradesh (India) with an aim to determine the occupational health risks of agricultural workers handling pesticides in the apple orchards. The study also included the chronic and acute health effects as well as a bivariate analysis to identify the factor affecting acute pesticide poisoning (APP). It was found that most of the respondents lacked safe operational practices. About 52% used sticks for mixing of pesticides, 15% used hands, 65% stored the pesticide in the houses, and only 24% had formal pesticide spray training. Regarding awareness of WHO colour code, 59% had seen the codes, and 18% rightly identified the meaning of codes. In case of hygiene practices, 92% washed hands, and 96% changed the clothes after the pesticide spray. Most of the population (85%) had the acute health problems in handling the pesticides especially the spraying. Bivariate analysis showed that mixing technique, lack of education and working hours have significant effect on APP.
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Kumari, D., John, S. (2018). Safety and Occupational Health Hazards of Agricultural Workers Handling Pesticides: A Case Study. In: Siddiqui, N., Tauseef, S., Bansal, K. (eds) Advances in Health and Environment Safety. Springer Transactions in Civil and Environmental Engineering. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-7122-5_9
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