E-waste, and namely the informal processing of discarded electrical and electronic devices, is affecting the health of children, young people and expectant mothers worldwide, according to the 'Children and Digital Dumpsites' report from the World Health Organization. "In the same way the world has rallied to protect the seas and their ecosystems from plastic and microplastic pollution, we need to rally to protect our most valuable resource -the health of our children- from the growing threat of e-waste.” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
E-waste volumes are soaring worldwide. They reached 53.6 million metric tonnes in 2019, up 21 percent over the previous five years. Only 17.4 percent of that e-waste reached formal management or recycling facilities. The rest was illegally dumped, overwhelmingly in low or middle income countries, where it is recycled by informal workers. But even that 17.4 percent prevented 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents from getting released into the environment.
About 12.9 million women work in the informal waste sector, which potentially exposes them and their unborn children to toxic e-waste. Around 18 million children and adolescents, some as young as 6, are also actively engaged in the sector, of which waste processing is a sub-sector. Other children live, go to school and play near e-waste recycling centres where high levels of toxic chemicals, mostly lead and mercury, can damage their intellectual abilities. Children exposed to e-waste are particularly vulnerable to toxic chemicals because there are smaller, have less developed organs and are growing and developing rapidly. They absorb more pollutants relative to their size and are less able to metabolize or eradicate toxic substances from their bodies.
People looking to recover valuable materials such as copper or gold from e-waste expose themselves to over 1,000 harmful substances, including lead, mercury, nickel, brominated flame retardants and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). For expectant mothers, such exposure can affect the health and development of their unborn children. Exposure to lead can affect behaviour permanently in a number of ways; other e-waste can affect the lungs and thyroid, and increase risk for cancer and cardiovascular disease, for example.
Meanwhile, e-waste volumes are soaring worldwide. They reached 53.6 million metric tonnes in 2019, up 21 percent over the previous five years. Only 17.4 percent of that e-waste reached formal management or recycling facilities. The rest was illegally dumped, overwhelmingly in low or middle income countries, where it is recycled by informal workers. But even that 17.4 percent prevented 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents from getting released into the environment.
