# Combustion of plastic waste and human health effects in Guatemala

> **NIH NIH R01** · EMORY UNIVERSITY · 2023 · $119,612

## Abstract

ABSTRACT
Household waste burning, especially of plastics, is a major, but unaddressed environmental and health hazard
in low resource countries that lack a waste management infrastructure to properly dispose of waste. In rural
Guatemala, 95% of households use solid fuels for cooking and 71% burn waste as the primary means of
disposal. Plastic waste is burned in solid fuel (e.g., wood) cookstoves and in outdoor fires as a means of
disposal. ECOLECTIVOS is a cluster randomized trial using implementation research to develop and evaluate
community-level working groups that aim to reduce household burning of plastic waste. With this administrative
supplement we will select up to three environmental health community workers (promotoras) per village from
among the women who participate in the 12-week community working group sessions in 8 intervention villages.
We will use the Behavior Change Wheel and RE-AIM, two implementation science frameworks to assess
opportunities, capabilities and motivations that determine behaviors, as well as the reach, effectiveness,
adoption, implementation fidelity, maintenance, and sustainability of community-driven interventions. In Aim 1,
the promotoras will be trained to administer short checklist surveys to the 25 women in their village who
participate in the working groups and who continue to implement the intervention selected by the village (e.g.,
community recycling) to assess domains of COM-B and RE-AIM. The promotoras will communicate with
ECOLECTIVOS research staff about implementation bottlenecks (e.g., recycling truck didn’t arrive) and
successes (e.g., number of villagers engaged successfully in recycling). In Aim 2, the promotoras will help project
staff design and implement “intervention fairs” to be rolled out in 8 control villages. These fairs will be structured
to promote the uptake and adoption of intervention activities in nearby control villages. The project is relevant to
the NIEHS mission because it fosters collaboration between research and community groups in the conduct of
community-engaged research that aims to improve household and ambient air quality. Our findings will be
incorporated into community-driven public health actions with policymakers to develop programs in other local
contexts.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10747606
- **Project number:** 3R01ES032009-03S1
- **Recipient organization:** EMORY UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Eri Saikawa
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2023
- **Award amount:** $119,612
- **Award type:** 3
- **Project period:** 2021-08-18 → 2026-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10747606

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10747606, Combustion of plastic waste and human health effects in Guatemala (3R01ES032009-03S1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10747606. Licensed CC0.

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