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Busan’s Children’s Sand Playgrounds Found Free of Parasites

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Busan Metropolitan City Institute of Health & Environment (hereinafter “the Institute”) announced that it inspected sand from 106 children’s sand playgrounds across Busan this year for parasite eggs and confirmed that all sites met the environmental safety management standards under the Environmental Health Act.

In the initial inspection, parasite eggs were detected at four sites. However, these facilities completed improvement measures such as sand disinfection as mandated by their respective district and county authorities.
Following these measures, re-inspections confirmed that parasite eggs were no longer detected, and all inspected sand playgrounds ultimately received a “compliant” rating.

Sand has a porous structure that makes it susceptible to microorganism growth and exposure to external environmental contaminants. For this reason, maintaining cleanliness through regular removal of debris and waste is essential, and at least one disinfection is recommended between April and October, when human and pet activity tends to increase. Personal hygiene practices such as handwashing after using the facilities are also important.

In particular, pursuant to the Infectious Disease Control and Prevention Act, apartment complexes with 300 or more households are required to conduct steam disinfection at 100°C or higher or chemical disinfection at least twice a year.

Meanwhile, for sand playgrounds in apartment complexes that are more than 15 years old, analyses for heavy metals were also conducted. The five items tested were lead, cadmium, arsenic, mercury, and hexavalent chromium, and all were found to be below the standard levels.

The results showed lead at 5.0–140.3 mg/kg, cadmium at 0.31–1.37 mg/kg, arsenic ranging from non-detectable to 7.04 mg/kg, mercury from non-detectable to 0.14 mg/kg, and hexavalent chromium was not detected at any site.
Compared to the environmental safety management standards under the Environmental Health Act, the average detection levels were 14.8% for lead, 16.5% for cadmium, 8.8% for arsenic, and 0.5% for mercury, all of which are significantly low.

Lee Yong-joo, Director of the Busan Metropolitan City Institute of Health & Environment, stated, “We will continue conducting sand inspections so that children can use sand playgrounds safely and hygienically.” He added, “We ask facility managers to actively manage facility hygiene through sand disinfection and replacement, and for children and guardians to cooperate by practicing proper personal hygiene such as handwashing.”