Occupational exposure to cancer risk factors among health and social care workers in Europe: results from the Workers' Exposure Survey.

Occupational exposure to cancer risk factors is an important avoidable cause of cancer. The European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA) conducted a Workers' Exposure Survey (WES) on cancer risk factors to increase knowledge on the prevalence and circumstances of exposure to 24 known cancer risk factors and on workplace prevention strategies in Europe. This manuscript focusses on the human health and social care work activities (HeSCare) sector, one of the largest occupational sectors in Europe. WES includes 24 402 telephone interviews from 2022 to 2023 on workers in Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, and Spain. WES uses the Occupational Integrated Database Exposure Assessment System (OccIDEAS) where probable exposure to selected cancer risk factors during the last working week was automatically estimated based on workers' answers to detailed sets of questions adapted to the EU context. There were 3041 workers affiliated with the HeSCare sector and almost two-thirds (65.3%) were female. A total of 29.5% of workers were probably exposed to one or more of the included cancer risk factors and 7.8% to two or more. The most common exposures among those considered were to ionizing radiation (7.4%), diesel engine exhaust emissions (6.2%), solar ultraviolet radiation (6.1%), formaldehyde (5.2%), and benzene (4.8%). The most frequent exposures estimated to occur at a high level in HeSCare were formaldehyde (2.3%) and ethylene oxide (2.0%). WES provides valuable sector-specific data about exposure to the most common cancer risk factors in occupational settings in Europe.