Social Housing and Working-From-Home: An Ergonomic Analysis of Brazilian Dwelling During the Covid-19 Pandemic

In Brazil, covid-19 reached 5 million infected people, with more than 200 thousand deaths. It is the 3rd country in the global contamination ranking, behind only the USA and India. Studies have shown that the covid-19 pandemic lethally reached the poorest in the world, those who could not stop working during the social isolation. In Brazil, Valente (2020) published that 20% poorest had twice the chance to be infected than the 20% of the wealthiest people. The study relates living conditions in popular homes during the pandemic and focuses on working-from-home and occupants’ new needs from an ergonomics perspective. This research evaluated the ergonomic conditions in a social house dwelling in Brazil. Its users are a young couple and one child, who remained in social isolation for 03 months - from March to June 2020. The analysis included the environmental conditions as comfort, accessibility, habitability, functionality, privacy, and ergonomics. Results highlighted the provisional workstations inside minimal housing and the problems of sharing these workstations between the different users’ profiles. Interior dimensions and furniture were not prepared to accommodate working activities for such a long time and simultaneously for the whole family.