Environmental and Health Consequences of Irregular Disposal of Sharps in the State of Paraná

Abstract

: This study aims to describe aspects of the epidemiological profile associated with the improper disposal of sharps, with an emphasis on the environmental and occupational risks faced by workers outside the healthcare sector. It is a descriptive study with a retrospective epidemiological approach, based on the analysis of secondary data extracted from the Informatics Department of the Brazilian Unified Health System (DATASUS), obtained from notifications related to occupational accidents involving exposure to biological material, covering the period from 2018 to 2024. A total of 951 records were grouped. No deaths related to the reported incidents were identified during the period. Among the exposed workers, garbage collectors accounted for the majority of notifications (75.9%), followed by street sweepers (13.9%) and recyclable material pickers (10.2%). The gender distribution shows a predominance of males among garbage collectors (90.7%). Regarding ethnicity, most garbage collectors and street sweepers were white (69.9% and 47.7%, respectively). The majority of exposures occurred among workers aged 25 to 34. As for education, most recyclable pickers had not completed elementary school (52.5%). The causes of exposure reveal serious failures in waste handling: 78.7% of cases resulted from the improper disposal of sharps in regular trash, followed by disposal on the ground (6.6%) and mishandling of sharps containers (2.8%). The primary agent causing the accidents was the needle, responsible for over 86% of incidents across all occupations. The most frequently involved biological fluid was blood. Geographically, the highest number of notifications occurred in the Metropolitan Region (40.7%). Therefore, the findings highlight critical deficiencies in the safe handling of sharps and the need for greater oversight regarding their disposal to reduce occupational and environmental risks.