The National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa) has banned, throughout Brazil, the manufacture, import, sale and use in health services of thermometers and sphygmomanometers (blood pressure monitors) with mercury columns. The resolution was published this Tuesday (24) in the Official Gazette of the Union.
The equipment covered by the resolution has a transparent column containing mercury and is intended to measure body temperature and blood pressure values, indicated for use in health diagnostics. The prohibition does not apply to products for research, instrument calibration or use as a reference standard.
Also according to the resolution, thermometers and sphygmomanometers with a mercury column that are removed from use must follow Good Practices for Managing Health Service Waste, established by Anvisa in 2018.
Failure to comply with the resolution, according to the agency, constitutes a health infraction, without prejudice to applicable civil, administrative and criminal liabilities.
Understand
In 2022, Anvisa’s collegiate board approved, in a public meeting, a regulatory initiative on the subject, meeting a demand from the Minamata Convention, which took place in Japan in 2013 and to which Brazil is a signatory. According to the convention, mercury use should be reduced worldwide by 2020.
According to the agency, the heavy metal does not pose a direct danger to users of thermometers or pressure gauges, but it does pose a dangerous toxic agent in the environment when discarded. Anvisa also highlights that these devices already have market alternatives that do not use mercury columns.
“Digital thermometers and sphygmomanometers are health products widely used in Brazil and have the same clinical indications as those containing mercury. These devices also have their accuracy compulsorily assessed by the Brazilian Conformity Assessment System and are environmentally more sustainable.”
*Editing: Aécio Amado
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This content was originally published in Anvisa bans pressure gauge and thermometer with mercury column on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil

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