Research of the awareness level on occupational health and safety of employees participating in biocidal applications in municipality:The case study of Mersin province

With the entry into force of the OHS Law No. 6331 in 2012, a new era has begun for all stakeholders, regardless of the public and private sector, except for some exceptional institutions. In this context; Determination of the relationship between the hazard load of workplaces, risks related to hazards, inconveniences in the workplace, work accidents and occupational diseases draw attention as basic approaches. Evaluation of "chemical risk factors", one of the classified hazard groups, in the workplace is very important because of the serious consequences of chemical exposure. In relation to this situation, biocidal (non-agricultural pesticide) applications in different areas, which are one of the important responsibilities of municipalities, and the health and safety of employees are one of the important topics that need to be addressed. It has been demonstrated by many scientific studies by researchers on the subject that practitioners face many health problems related to pesticide exposure and active substance type and exposure intensity. When the risk assessment reports prepared for biocidal applications are examined, it is observed that there are different evaluations especially on the defined hazards. It is very important to prepare a comprehensive and complete hazard checklist in areas where non-compliance with dangerous situations and behaviors such as biocidal applications may be high, in terms of improving the health conditions of the employees and the society. In this context, the main purpose of the thesis; It is the re-evaluation and regulation of the biocidal application process with recommendations that can be transferred to the field in terms of occupational health and safety. For this purpose, the current situation was determined by applying a questionnaire to the employees. Within the scope of the study, first of all, the awareness level and behavior patterns of the municipal employees who have biocidal applications in their job descriptions were determined, and concrete suggestions were made for the knowledge that the employees should have based on these compiled data. It is aimed to use the results obtained in this study to encourage safer practices when using biocidal products, and therefore to operate a systematic process. According to the results; 97.4% of the 151 biocidal application personnel applied at least 6 hours a day. On the other hand, no more than 5 hours.The rate of employees who are employed and therefore have the least exposure time is 2.6%. While 24.1% of the employees reported that they sprayed for 1 hour uninterruptedly on a daily basis, 34.5% of the employees stated that they applied biocidal for 3 hours a day. It has been determined that a great majority (97.4%) of the employees working in biocidal applications carry out spraying activities every day. Keywords: Biocidal, biocidal application, health and safety, chemical risks, occupational disease, municipality.