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Fungal burden in waste industry: an occupational risk to be solved

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Abstract

High loads of fungi have been reported in different types of waste management plants. This study intends to assess fungal contamination in one waste-sorting plant before and after cleaning procedures in order to analyze their effectiveness. Air samples of 50 L were collected through an impaction method, while surface samples, taken at the same time, were collected by the swabbing method and subject to further macro- and microscopic observations. In addition, we collected air samples of 250 L using the impinger Coriolis μ air sampler (Bertin Technologies) at 300 L/min airflow rate in order to perform real-time quantitative PCR (qPCR) amplification of genes from specific fungal species, namely Aspergillus fumigatus and Aspergillus flavus complexes, as well as Stachybotrys chartarum species. Fungal quantification in the air ranged from 180 to 5,280 CFU m−3 before cleaning and from 220 to 2,460 CFU m−3 after cleaning procedures. Surfaces presented results that ranged from 29 × 104 to 109 × 104 CFU m−2 before cleaning and from 11 × 104 to 89 × 104 CFU m−2 after cleaning. Statistically significant differences regarding fungal load were not detected between before and after cleaning procedures. Toxigenic strains from A. flavus complex and S. chartarum were not detected by qPCR. Conversely, the A. fumigatus species was successfully detected by qPCR and interestingly it was amplified in two samples where no detection by conventional methods was observed. Overall, these results reveal the inefficacy of the cleaning procedures and that it is important to determine fungal burden in order to carry out risk assessment.

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Funding

The authors are grateful to the Occupational Health Services from the analyzed plant and also to the Environment and Health Research Group from Lisbon School of Health Technology. This study was supported by the Lisbon School of Health Technology. Raquel Sabino was financially supported by a fellowship from Fundacão para a Ciência e Tecnologia Portugal (contract SFRH/BPD/72775/2010).

Conflicts of interest

The authors state that there is no potential conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Environment and Health RG, Lisbon School of Health Technology, Polytechnic Institute of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal

    Carla Viegas, Tiago Faria, Mateus dos Santos, Elisabete Carolino, Anita Quintal Gomes, Raquel Sabino & Susana Viegas

  2. Environmental Health Institute, Faculty of Medicine from Lisbon University, Lisbon, Portugal

    Carla Viegas

  3. Institute of Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal

    Anita Quintal Gomes

  4. Mycology Laboratory, Instituto Nacional de Saúde Dr. Ricardo Jorge, Lisbon, Portugal

    Raquel Sabino

  5. Centro de Investigação e Estudos em Saúde Pública, Escola Nacional de Saúde Pública, ENSP, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal

    Susana Viegas

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  1. Carla Viegas
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  2. Tiago Faria
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  3. Mateus dos Santos
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  4. Elisabete Carolino
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  7. Susana Viegas
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Correspondence to Carla Viegas.

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Viegas, C., Faria, T., dos Santos, M. et al. Fungal burden in waste industry: an occupational risk to be solved. Environ Monit Assess 187, 199 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-015-4412-y

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