Art Gray Child Cement Limbs Blocks Image United States
M ichael has worked with concrete for 27 years. His job involves "breaking out" walls and floors, mixing physical, injection work and drilling. These days, he suffers from chronic breathlessness, has had a coughing for around iii years and struggles to walk long distances. It is suspected that an emphysema-like condition chosen silicosis is to blame. Cheers to early-onset arthritis, he'south had both knees replaced. He'due south 49.
Though it might not be obvious to the millions of people who spend their days surrounded by this patently innocuous material, concrete costs the wellness – and ofttimes the lives – of thousands of construction workers every year. The chief culprit is silica dust, which hangs in the air on building sites. Without proper protection, it can, over many years in the trade, scar the lungs and pb to silicosis, which is associated with chronic wheezing, arthritis, cancer and reduced life expectancy.
"Information technology'southward like a death sentence hanging over you," says Michael. "It affects me, it affects my family, it affects everything, you know what I mean?"
Q&A What is Guardian physical week?
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This week Guardian Cities investigates the shocking impact of concrete on the planet, to learn what nosotros can practice to bring about a less grey world.
Our species is addicted to physical. We employ more of it than annihilation else except water. Similar that other manmade wonder material, plastic, physical transformed construction and advanced human being health. But, as with plastic, nosotros are but now waking upward to its dangers.
Physical causes up to 8% of global CO2 emissions; if it were a land it would exist the globe's worst culprit after the US and China. It fills our rubbish dumps, overheats our cities, causes floods that kills thousands of people – and fundamentally changes our human relationship to the planet.
Can we boot our addiction, when information technology's so difficult to imagine modern life without it? In this series of articles, Concrete Calendar week will explore the impact of the material on our environs and us, and look at culling options for the future.
Chris Michael, Cities editor
Positive improvement
Concrete is modernity'due south foundation stone: it surrounds united states in bridges, motorways, tunnels, hospitals, stadiums and churches – from the Roman Pantheon, which is what God might pour if he had a concrete mixer, to Clifton Cathedral in Bristol, which looks like the ashtray where he would stub out his cigarettes. From the roads that carry medicines to the sewage pipes that whisk away waste, from the dams that deliver drinking water on tap to the walls that provide shelter and warmth, modern life every bit we know it is unimaginable without concrete's stability, durability, sterility and relative cheapness. But what impact does this ultra-difficult, ultra-durable substance have on our soft human bodies?
It can certainly transform public wellness for the meliorate. In 2000, Mexico'due south Coahuila land launched an initiative called Piso Firme ("firm floor"), which involved pouring concrete floors for low-income households that had previously been forced to make do with clay. The aim was to reduce hookworm disease – a parasitic infection contracted by walking barefoot on soil, where hookworm larvae burrow in through skin and air current up in the digestive tract, stunting children's growth and affecting their schooling.
Once the new floors had been installed, children in concreted homes experienced a 78% drop in parasite infection rates, while anaemia plummeted by 80%, diarrhoea barbarous by half and test scores improved dramatically. By 2005, 10% of Mexico's dirt-floor houses had made the switch to physical. Even in the adult world its nonreactive nature makes concrete the ideal allergy-friendly flooring surface, performing better for respiratory ailments than carpeting, tile and floorboard, which harbour dust mites, leaner, germs and mildew.
Painful impact
When it comes to negative impacts, perhaps the first thing to consider is our joints. The surfaces humanity traversed equally it evolved were far more forgiving than those we now spend much of our fourth dimension on. Weather condition suffered by mill workers possibly offer the clearest example of concrete'southward furnishings on the feet, knees and hips: many manufacturing jobs involve continuing for long periods on hard floor, day after 24-hour interval, calendar week in, calendar week out.
"A lot of patients come through our doors who piece of work in heavy engineering," says Andrew Cumming at the Royal Orthopaedic hospital (ROH) in Birmingham. "At that place are some large car factories effectually the West Midlands and the Black Land, and nosotros get a lot of people who stand up on a track, working eight-, 9-, 10-hour shifts. That's where we see our classic heel-hurting person come up in. It can accept a knock-on consequence on other [musculoskeletal] structures, besides."
The about common complaint is plantar fasciitis, a painful inflammation of the band of tissue that runs across the lesser of the foot, connecting the heel to the toes. Cumming can prescribe stretching, steroid injections and shockwave therapy, but whatever treatment is unlikely to exist effective without workers being immune to sit down downwardly or take a break from the physical. "Sometimes people have to change career," he says.
Cumming gets referrals from 2 other professions that spend a lot of time walking and standing on physical: instruction and nursing. "Anecdotally, the physical wards and floors in hospitals could exist a problem," he says.
Health and safety advice worldwide takes it as read that concrete floors cause ailments as diverse every bit varicose veins, achilles tendonitis and osteoarthritis. An entire manufacture has grown upwardly around anti-fatigue matting, which, it is thought, mitigates tiredness by requiring constant microadjustments in balance.
The science on the subject, withal, is inconclusive. Scientists at Loughborough Academy found that continuing for every bit little as xc minutes on concrete "caused serious discomfort to the feet, legs and back of the study participants" along with stiffness of the cervix and shoulders; another study showed hard floors increased the risk of plantar fasciitis at assembly plants.
But in 2002 a review of all the literature in the field institute "no unequivocal support" for the effects of cumulative industrial trauma on seven weather condition of the human foot and ankle, including plantar fasciitis. Although information technology is known that concrete floors crusade lameness in cattle, leading to "joint swelling and body lesions, as well as abnormalities in resting behaviour and postural changes", more research into its effect on humans is needed.
Seeming to support the link betwixt physical and injury is the experience of another major group with orthopaedic problems: runners. "The contrast between treadmill runners and concrete runners is actually quite marked," says Cumming. Patient numbers not bad at the ROH after Christmas, when a wave of erstwhile athletes bring together running clubs with new year enthusiasm.
Nick Anderson, lead marathon trainer for the England athletics team, strictly limits the number of miles his clients do on concrete. "We practice see more than injury issues with the route than with running on trails," he says. "I tend to get runners to do only nigh 30-forty% on the roads – the rest will be on trails or softer basis. Route running is important but information technology volition speed up injury rates because it's a hard surface."
Anderson says it is acknowledged in the running world – from coaches to physios to the athletes themselves – that physical wreaks havoc on the joints. "We coach people getting ready for the Olympics, and a lot of world-class athletes running large volumes practise nearly of their weekly training off-road," he says. "Road running's fantastic – I'm not against it, I love information technology. But I'thousand always trying to get runners to railroad train on a multitude of surfaces, just to reduce to stress that the torso is having to deal with all the time."
The very evenness of the surface can also present a trouble. "If the route is flat, often you lot get what I would telephone call overuse biomechanical injuries, because you recreate the aforementioned foot plant all the fourth dimension," says Anderson. "Ultimately, though, it all ends upward in the lower back, because everything in terms of the shock and stress will transfer upward."
The science, again, is non conclusive. "The relationship between touch loads and physical surfaces is conflicting," says Toby Smith, technical lead physiotherapist at the English Institute of Sport, which provides support to the Olympic and Paralympic squads. "The literature indicates that muscle activity, running speed and technique have a greater influence on articulation loads than the type of surface. In essence, it's more about how the runner interacts with a surface rather than type of surface which influences the joint loads."
Silica and condom
But the respiratory problems on building sites and in cities around the world remain – and there is no lack of scientific consensus about those.
Physical is a mixture of 3 components: water; "aggregates" such every bit gravel, sand or crushed rock; and cement, which acts as a binding agent. The cement causes many bug: it is highly toxic, prompting eye, pare and respiratory tract irritation, and contains calcium oxide, corrosive to human tissue, and chromium, which tin can prompt severe allergic reactions.
Then in that location's silica. Naturally nowadays in the Earth's crust in sand and quartz, this material assumes its lethal form of respirable crystalline silica (RCS) dust during heavy industrial processes like cut, drilling, blasting and demolition. Independently of silicosis, RCS can as well atomic number 82 to asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, tuberculosis and kidney disease.
Lung cancer caused past long-term grit exposure kills an boilerplate of 789 Uk workers every year – or roughly xv a week. Whereas it was previously idea that this type of cancer was acquired by silicosis, silica dust itself is now recognised equally a carcinogenic substance.
Prof Sir Anthony Newman Taylor of Imperial College'south National Heart and Lung Institute says: "I recollect at that place's sufficient evidence that silica itself is carcinogenic. And if you say that, then there tin can be no threshold [for prophylactic exposure]."
Since silica's dangers came to light, the UK regime's Wellness and Safety Executive (HSE) has pushed construction bosses to take a tighter approach to protective equipment, launched awareness campaigns such as Go Home Salubrious, and published extensive safety information online.
Despite this, many say the HSE'south stance on workplace silica is not strict enough. The U.k.'south current legal limit for silica exposure is 0.1mg/1000³, averaged over an eight-hour shift. The United states, still, recently halved its legal limit to 0.05mg/k³ after extensive lobbying by its own health and safety torso, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
The HSE says information technology cannot replicate this meliorate standard due to the costs and technical difficulties involved – even though its own literature shows that 6 times as many workers are at risk of silicosis over a 45-year career at 0.1mg/one thousand³ than with 0.05mg/thou³. Meanwhile, jurisdictions like Portugal and British Columbia enforce even lower limits of 0.025mg/chiliad³ – a quarter of the U.k. limit. Deutschland has gone one step farther, reclassifying silica dust every bit a carcinogen and minimising exposure birthday.
Meanwhile, Michael, the structure worker, paints a picture show of an industry ignorant of silica'south long-term effects. "It'southward just recently that they really enforced masks and things similar that," he says. "Almost 10 years ago they started pushing for information technology – but sometimes y'all didn't have the equipment, so it wasn't an choice. You just had to carry on."
He believes there are others at his firm showing the symptoms of silicosis. "Oh, there's a skillful 25 of united states that take been there over 25 years. And I would say nearly of them are good suspects of having it. And that's merely ane company."
He's currently waiting for terminal confirmation that the scarring on his lungs revealed past x-rays is indeed silicosis, although he says he "already half-knows".
Michael'south advice to younger workers? "Forcefulness the upshot. Physically ask for the mask before you do anything, because if you don't ask for it, they'll let you crack on and use drills and grinders – because they know that in a year there'due south going to be a completely different gang of workers in at that place."
Guardian Concrete Week investigates the shocking bear on of physical on the modernistic world. Follow Guardian Cities on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and use the hashtag #GuardianConcreteWeek to join the discussion or sign upwardly for our weekly newsletter
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Source: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/feb/28/hard-living-what-does-concrete-do-to-our-bodies
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