Uso de Equipamentos de Proteção Individual e Análise do glifosato em propriedades rurais do Espírito Santo

Glyphosate, known commercially as Roundup®, is a herbicide widely used in coffee plantations in Espírito Santo State. However little is known about the safety measures in its management or the quantity of glyphosate in the environment. We investigated the use of personal protective equipment(PPE) and quantified traces of the herbicide in samples of water, soil, leaves and grains from four sites, the Colatina, Pancas, Santa Tereza and São Gabriel, using UV/VIS spectrophotometry. Antibiograms were used to investigate the sensitivity of the human intestinal microflora to glyphosate. Post hoc Tukey tests were used to investigate mean differences (p<0.05). The graphs were evaluated using the Excel 2010 program. None of the farms used PPE properly. Although water extracted from Pancas and São Gabriel was not contaminated, all the soil samples had high concentrations of glyphosate and the grain and leaf samples also had high levels of glyphosate(≥7.5mg/L). These concentrations pose a risk to human health because a concentration of 7.5mg/L was sufficient to eliminate Escherichia coliand Enterecoccus from intestinal flora.