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Women, work and health: a Canada-Venezuela
collaborative project Since 1995, our research centre, CINBIOSE, at the University of QuÈbec in MontrÈal, has had a joint program with the Centro de estudios de salud de los trabajadores (CEST) at the Universidad de Carabobo in Venezuela, for the study of women’s occupational health. This program, "Mujer, salud, trabajo", funded by a four-year grant from the Canadian International Development Agency provides: scholarships for CEST professors to study ergonomics, biology and environmental sciences; development of courses and teaching material for Venezuelan workers; organisation of 3 joint Canada-Latin America seminars on various aspects of the study of women’s occupational health, involving other Latin American countries. The programme is co-directed by Doris Acevedo and ourselves. Although our principal partner is CEST, we also work with the Women’s Centre (Casa de la mujer) and Worker Training School (Escuela de formaciÛn obrera) in Maracay. This reflects our long-standing practice of doing training and research in collaboration with workers, in the context of a University of QuÈbec - union agreement that was set up in 1976 and an agreement with women’s grassroots organisations that dates from 1981. These agreements have allowed CINBIOSE researchers in biological sciences, ergonomics, sociology and legal sciences to develop an original approach to the study of the occupational health of women workers. Synthesising natural and social science methods, we characterise the risk factors in jobs traditionally held by women, how the representations of women and of women’s work puts them at a disadvantage in the occupational health prevention and compensation system, as well as the health consequences for women who enter non-traditional jobs. We also examine the difficulties involved in balancing work and family responsibilities. We find that, although women are usually excluded from jobs with dramatically dangerous conditions, their working conditions are often far from favourable to their health. On a physical level, their presence in highly repetitive jobs puts them at risk for musculoskeletal disorders which, although not directly fatal, cause years of suffering. Work which often requires sustained static effort such as prolonged standing also results in back problems. The fast pace and multiple tasks involved in many jobs where women are found also result in physical as well as mental stress. The projects now going on in
Venezuela include: There have been positive effects in QuÈbec as well. Our students have wider horizons and an awareness of other countries which is rare in QuÈbec. One of the students gave Spanish classes to QuÈbecers. Another student’s final project, a study of the work activity in a hospital laundry, was so well done that he was invited by the hospital to be a paid consultant when the laundry was reorganised. Problems still unsolved are: how to ensure that the Latin Americans have time for their projects once they return home; how to facilitate integration of research results into workplace practices in countries where the union movement is not strong; and, of course, how to incorporate gender-sensitivity into occupational health theory and practice (on both continents).
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