The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

Abstract #48868

Leslie Clarke, PhD¹, Joan Flocks, JD², Carol A. Bryant, PhD³, and Paul Monaghan, PhD². (1) Health Policy and Epidemiology, University of Florida, P.O. Box 100177, Room 5230, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32610-0177, 352-246-3545, llc@hpe.ufl.edu, (2) Department of Health Policy and Epidemiology, University of Florida, P.O. Box 100177, Room 5230, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32610-0177, (3) Department of Community and Family Health, University of South Florida, 13201 Bruce B Downs Blvd, MDC 56, Tampa, FL 33612-3805

Agricultural employers and workers in Florida are exposed to a range of pesticides that are applied to crops and soil. The most common ways exposure occurs is through dermal, oral, and respiratory contact. Federal and State regulations are designed to keep exposure to a minimum, but the costs and feasibility of these regulations often result in poor implementation and enforcement. For example, despite regulations, there is often inadequate training of workers and limited access to handwashing facilities. The Together for Agricultural Safety (TAS) project was created in 1997 to address these issues. TAS is a collaboration between the community-based Farmworker Association of Florida and health science researchers at the University of Florida, and is funded by the the National Institute of Environmental Sciences (NIEHS). The project has used a social marketing framework to define the research question, collect extensive primary data from employers and workers, and develop and implement an educational intervention. The project is being evaluated using an experimental design. This paper will present a summary of the intervention and early evaluation data on the impact of the intervention. Data will be presented on changes in knowledge of workplace safety, changes in handwashing practices, changes in access to handwashing facilities, and changes in rates of dermatitis and other health problems among workers following the intervention as compared to baseline data.

Learning Objectives:

• Participants will understand the health risks of exposure to agrichemicals.
• Participants will understand barriers to risk reduction and perceptions of farm owners and workers of these barriers.
• Participants will learn how social marketing principles can be used to guide data collection, analysis and program development.
• Participants will understand how the program intervention impacted farm owners and farm workers.

Keywords: Agricultural Work Safety, Environmental Health

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.