Catharina Wesseling: Health Effects from Pesticide Use in Costa Rica - an epidemiologic approach. Institute for Environmental Medicine, Karolinska Institute and National Institute for Working Life, Stockholm 1997. (English)

The use of toxic pesticides is increasing in developing countries, often under unsafe conditions. Poisonings are a well-known but underreported public health problem, and studies on long-term effects are sparse. Therefore, a survey was carried out to determine the incidence and the risk factors for pesticide poisonings in Costa Rica, integrating data from national registries of occupational accidents, hospitaliza-tions, and fatalities between 1980-1986. A case series further assessed the exposures that can lead to a fatal outcome in nonintentional paraquat poisonings. A cross-sectional study among 211 banana plantation workers tested the hypothesis that chronic neurobehavioral deficits occur as a consequence of previous intoxication with cholinesterase inhibiting pesticides. An ecologic study tested the hypothesis that geographical differences in cancer incidence are associated with pesticide use. A cohort of 34,457 banana plantation workers with more than 400,000 person years was established to assess the cancer pattern among workers with a high level of expo-sure to pesticides (in particular dibromo-chloro-propane), and to examine the feasibility of computerized record linkage between various registries in Costa Rica. In addition, health hazards from pesticide use in the Third World were reviewed, and some possibilities and limi-tations for epidemiologic research in developing countries were assessed.

Cholinesterase inhibitors and paraquat caused the vast majority of the poisonings. Young workers, female workers and banana plantation workers were the groups at highest risk for occupational poisonings. Suicide as a cause of severe poison-ings was less frequent than expected. It was estimated that, yearly, 1.5% of the agricultural workers suffer a work-related pesticide poison-ing requiring medical attention. The case series suggested that paraquat may be fatal by dermal absorption of diluted paraquat, by ingestion of very low doses, and possibly by inhalation of diluted spray. Mild neurobehavioral deficits were found among previously poisoned workers, both by organo-phosphates and carbamates; after a poisoning, the workers seemed to become more susceptible to subsequent low-dose exposures to cholinesterase inhibitors. Pesticide use was associated with increased cancer incidence in the most rural areas of Costa Rica, including lung and female hormone-related cancers. Male banana plantation workers were at increased risk of melanoma and penile cancer, and female workers of cervical cancer and leukemia. Pesticides appear to be a public health problem throughout the Third World. Epidemiologic research to assess these problems is difficult because of methodological and infrastructure restrictions. However, high exposures provide good opportunities to carry out etiologic research; another advantage is that participation rates are often very high. Registry based studies may be feasible, but sometimes after costly improvements of the registries. This thesis indicates that pesticide exposure in Costa Rica is associated with an increased risk of various health effects.

Catharina Wesseling
Institute of Environmental Medicine
Karolinska Institute
Box 210
171 77 Stockholm, Sweden
telephone: 08-728 74 81
telefax: 08-31 39 61
E-mail: catharina.wesseling@imm.ki.se

Marianne Döös: Learning from disturbances in relation to automated production.
Pedagogic Institute, Stockholms University. Stockholm 1997. (Swedish)

Technical development and new organization solutions have given rise to changed demands on operators as handlers of disturbances in modern industrial production. This thesis is concerned with learning in relation to the man-agement of disturbances in automated produc-tion. Its main purpose is to contribute to theo-retical development in the arena of individual learning by, on the basis of empirically founded analyses, understanding, conceptualizing and illustrating the learning of the individual in relation to a specific work task. The task is both complex and complicated, and is strongly linked to modern production technology.

The empirical study is founded on the perspec-tive of contextual didactics, within which con-structivism, action theory and the concept of affordance constitute the essential points of departure. Action links the individual and the situation in a specific context. Actual per-formance is a precondition for task-related learn-ing to take place.

Adopting a qualitative, case-study approach, the study was conducted at a large Swedish engineering company. It covered 14 operators and two production lines for the manufacture of transmission shafts. Data were collected using interviews and observations, supplemented, e.g., by disturbance-reporting. Analytical generaliza-tion was applied.

The results show that ad-hoc fixing "for the time being" is something performed by all operators. Situations that prompt this type of action include running behind schedule, needing to get production going quickly, and unclear faults, those that appear irregularly, do not cause much bother, or disappear on re-rigging. Situations that prompt permanent solutions are related to recurring troublesome faults, those that are intolerable, or those giving rise to a risk of machine malfunction or poor product quality.
Learning in a work task takes place in small steps where the everyday experience is needed as a basis for being attentive of, understanding, and remedying disturbances. The ingrained has an important function. Quality in particular experiences is of importance for learning the task. Qualifying disturbance handling is characterized by being ramified, cyclically complete and having a question of one's own at hand. As conceivable structural concepts to operationalize individual learning in a specific, situation-related and complex work task, thought networks and dimensional stances are proposed. Learning can be described as a contextualization process in which everyday experience is transformed by means of situations appearing as normal, typical or exceptional. Personal know-how is built on discerning and utilizing the everyday details.
Marianne Döös
National Institute for Working Life
171 84 Solna, Sweden
telephone: 08-617 03 76
telefax: 08-653 17 50
E-mail: marianne.doos@niwl.se

Arne Wangel: Safety politics and risk perceptions in Malaysian industry.
Doctoral thesis, Department of Sociology. Lund University. Lund 1997. (Danish)

The thesis deals with the analysis of work hazards and safety in industrial enterprises in Peninsular Malaysia, Southeast Asia. It traces the development of this theme of conflict within the context constituted by state, labour market and labour-management relations in Malaysia. The thesis focuses on metalworkers' immediate experiences about work hazards. Thus, the analysis is based upon an approach inspired by phenomenological sociology by which theoreti-cal contributions from Evans, Rueschemeyer and Skocpol about the structuring of the social actors' resources performed by the state from Burawoy, Beronius, and Adesina about production politics and social relations in the labour process provides an integrated perspective on individual risk perceptions, safety practices in enterprises, and government regulation.

The empirical data were collected during the period 1989-92 by means of participant obser-vation, qualitative interviews and company case studies. The study of the theme of conflict involves three main questions: What is the significance of foreign models for governmental regulation and managerial strategies in terms of shaping conflicts about work hazards and safety, when compared with the influence of local conditions? What kind of process develops, as local theory about work hazards are formed among workers? And, which are the opportunities for changing working environment institutions in Malaysia? The first part of the book discusses traditions and theories within working environment research. The origin of legally defined standards, the pattern of interests among the key social actors, the views of professionals on causes of work hazards and their control, as well as the problem of applying a concept of working environment related to wage labour in a study on working life in developing countries, are covered among other things. The second part discusses the relations between state and civil society in Malaysia, labour market policies and state regulation of work hazards. The description of a serious accident at work illus-trates the nature of the monitoring conducted by the authorities as well as the strategies to counter threats to their legitimacy. The third part of the thesis deepens the analysis of the enterprise level. Workers' statements about their experience of work hazards are the point of departure for investigating the issue of work hazards within the field of tension between managerial control and workers' resistance. Inarticulate knowledge about physical and psychic effects are confronted by 'wisdom', which is expressed as part of the factory discipline. The book shows how the know-ledge systems of various actors - subjective meanings, tacit knowledge, technical/medical information, and legal definitions - clash within the pattern of the social relations of the factory. The safety practices of the individual company are discussed on the basis of a series of case descriptions. Finally, an overview of social actors' access to knowledge resources identifies barriers and opportunities for change. The conclusion gives emphasis to the contrast between workers' immediate experiences and the codification of knowledge about work injuries for the purpose of economic compensation. The thesis shows that the nature of knowledge forma-tion on the working environment and its ascribed legitimacy is associated with particular forms of social practice. Thus, the common paradigm about objective knowledge as a source to a com-plete control of work hazards is unsound. Instead, the limitations of the knowledge formation and the activities, which are exercised by referring to such rationality, have to be carefully examined. "Safety Politics and Risk Perceptions in Malay-sian Industry" identifies analytical perspectives, which in detail are able to trace conflicts about the working environment in the industries of developing countries. The thesis provides a thorough account of the conditions of industrial labour in one of Southeast Asia's growth econo-mies. It is shown how this field develops at enterprise level in working situations charac-terized by serious hazards, uneven power re-sources and workers' resignation. At the same time, the significance of the particular political regime and path of industrialization is investigated. The thesis rejects the simplified view of cross-cultural ergonomics concerning the relationship between working environment techniques and society and questions the applicability of concepts drawn from the origins of working environment regulation in Western Europe.

Arne Wangel
Dept. of Technology and Social Sciences
Technical University of Denmark
Building 322
DK-2800 Lyngby, Denmark
telephone: +45 4525 6011
telefax: +45 4588 1291
E-mail: amb@its.dtu.dk

The book can be ordered from the above address.

Ester Galli: The social dimension of major accidents.
Thesis for Masters Degree in Environmental Sciences. University of São Paulo, Brazil 1997. (Portugese)

Risk analysis is increasingly used outside the nuclear industry - perhaps most often in the chemical industry, where accidents with far-reaching consequences have occurred recently. Vila Socó, San Juan Ixhuatepec, Bhopal, Seveso, Flixborough are names that remind us of recent chemical disasters. The contribution of risk analysis to the prevention of major chemical hazards has been substantial and its development has generated a number of beneficial effects in several fields. Although all beneficial effects and contributions generated by its development, mainly in the physical, chemical and biological areas, one has to remember the limitations and uncertaintities of its methods. The contribution of social factors in this respect seems likely to be substantial, and this is an area strongly in need of research. Although work is in progress, this topic is in its infancy compared to the hardware side of risk analysis. The conclusion is that it is necessary to stimulate the dialogue between the different disciplines compounding the risk analy-sis universe, to develop an interdisciplinary approach, considering that no one alone can fulfill the needs of a complete analysis of such complex issues such as major accidents. This thesis is an effort to magnify the limits of risk analysis including the social dimension of the production systems in the causal analysis of major accidents.

Ester Galli
Rua Alexandre Dumas 590, Apt. 143
CEP-04717-000
São Paulo, Brazil
telephone: +55 11 5181 1440
telefax: +55 11 5181 1440
E-mail: ester.g@uol.com.br