Abstract:
Environmental heavy metal contamination is a global occurrence, many governments still do not prioritize the accompanying environmental and public health consequences. Activities related to car repairing, polishing, painting, etc., have emerged in many developing countries like Pakistan as a consequence of low-level, unspecialized industrial and manufacturing concerns. Workers in irregular small industrial units (SIUs) who work with metal, wood, and spray paints are exposed to a variety of health risks. Numerous workers in Pakistan regularly come into contact with these chemicals, but due to improper reporting, no such data is accessible. The most crucial steps in identifying and preventing a variety of dangers that vary with different occupational categories and job duties are exposure assessments. This study centers on assessing the level of workers' awareness to the use of PPEs, the carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health risks assessment of metal exposures from scrap paint dust. Samples of scrap car paint dust from Khadda Market, Islamabad and Rawalpindi were collected from 8 different workshops (A-H). They were sieved, filtered, and digested by standard method. The scrap paint dust samples were analyzed for heavy metals by using Flame Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (AAS). Heavy metals cancerous and non-cancerous risk was determined by calculating the exposure concentration (EC), (g/m'), the estimated daly intake (EDI), (mg/kg/day) of metals, the hazard quotient (HQ) and lifetime cancer risk (LTCR), The results showed a general trend of concentration of metals in scrap paint dust, Cu, >Ni, > Pb, > Cr, >Cd. The concentration of copper was high in all samples of scraped paint collected from workshops in Islamabad and Rawalpindi however the concentrations of nickel, chromium, and lead were increasingly high. Cadmium had the lowest concentrations in all collected samples. The majority of workers do not have formal training in painting or denting;, they typically learn about hazards, risks of exposure, and PPE use while performing their duties in the workplace. The use of personal protective equipment was poor, with only 10% workers having access to PPEs, the remaining 90% had no PPEs to wear. Lack of protective equipment was singled out in the targeted workshops to be the main perceived reason for work related exposures among the workers. The results of hazard quotient had shown the descending order of Cr > Cu> Ni> Pb> Cd, the values for Chromium (Cr) were highest
