A new study led by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), carried out in collaboration with the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU-OSHA), shows that a significant share of health and social care workers in Europe are regularly exposed to substances and conditions linked to cancer.
The research, published in the European Journal of Public Health, draws on data from the Workers’ Exposure Survey (WES), the first survey of its kind carried out in Europe. Between 2022 and 2023, researchers conducted 24,402 telephone interviews with workers in Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland and Spain, using a task-based questionnaire to estimate exposure to 24 recognised cancer risk factors.
The findings are striking: 29.5% of workers in the health and social care sector reported exposure to at least one cancer risk factor during their last working week, and 7.8% were exposed to two or more. The sector is one of the largest in Europe, employing around 21.6 million people, or roughly 11% of the total workforce.
Iosnising radiation and diesel engine exhaust emissions
The most frequently reported exposures were ionising radiation (7.4%), diesel engine exhaust emissions (6.2%), solar UV radiation (6.1%), formaldehyde (5.2%) and benzene (4.8%). Formaldehyde and ethylene oxide, which are both widely used for disinfection and sterilisation, were the substances most often linked to high exposure levels, pointing to routine infection-control practices as an underappreciated source of risk.
According to Michelle Turner, ISGlobal researcher and senior author of the study, risks associated with carcinogen exposure in the health and social care sector have historically received less attention than in other industries. The authors argue that prevention strategies need to be better tailored to the real working conditions in this field, rather than modelled on higher-profile industrial sectors.
Protective measures
The study’s task-based approach, asking workers to describe the specific activities they carried out, rather than relying solely on job titles, also made it possible to assess how consistently protective measures were used, highlighting concrete areas where workplace safety could be strengthened.
Occupational exposure to carcinogens remains one of the leading causes of work-related cancer in the EU, with cancer responsible for around 100,000 work-related deaths each year. The WES findings underline that health and social care workers deserve greater attention in cancer prevention policy and practice across Europe.
- Read more about exposure risks for nurses in our occupations section.
