Riesgos laborales en trabajadores del sector informal del Cauca, Colombia

Abstract

Background. A national study already led to establishing informal workers' exposure to risks in Colombia; however, the Cauca department was not included in this. Objective. Describing the occupational hazards of people working in the informal sector in five municipalities in the Cauca department during 2011. Materials and methods. This was a descriptive, cross-sectional study which involved 223 people; they answered questions from a standardised national survey. Results. The survey revealed that more than 20% of the people driving taxis and/or working in the dairy sector were exposed to risks regarding safety and about 1 in 4 of the hawkers, porters and vendors selling food in the street were exposed to environmental hazards. Porters had the highest exposure to health-related and physical load-related risks. Over 50% of porters, street-sellers and people selling minutes for cell phones were at location-specific individual risk (LSIR) and about 1 in 4 of the hawkers and street food-sellers were exposed to risk regarding public order. Conclusions. The risks to which workers were exposed in the informal sector in the municipalities studied in the Cauca department coincided with those found by a prior national study; however, a lack of organisation within groups of workers and a lack of public policy could trigger increased morbidity and mortality rates in this population.