National Conversation on Public Health and Chemical Exposures Education and Communication Work Group report November 2010

education_and_communication_final_report.pd

Inequalities in work-related fatal injuries

Work-related fatal injuries are predominantly a problem among males. The group most affected is those aged 55 years and over. In some European countries the mortality rate from work injuries has decreased for both sexes, but the greater reduction among female workers maintains the trends, since 2011, of predominance of fatal injuries among males

Proceedings of Abstracts 12th International Conference on Air Quality Science and Application

© 2020 The Author(s). This an open access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Final Published versio

Phthalates mixtures in bottled water in Iran: human health risk assessment using direct and indirect exposure assessment

Phthalates are diesters of phthalic acid that are widely used in industry and personal care products resulting in exposure via ingestion, inhalation and dermal routes. There is an interest in the safety evaluation of phthalate exposure because these compounds are ubiquitous environmental contaminants with endocrine-disrupting properties, suspected to interfere with developmental androgen action, possibly leading to adverse effects on reproductive function. Toxicological properties of phthalates, the presence of phthalates in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles as impurities, the high and regular consumption of bottled water, and the uncertainty about the impact of storage conditions of PET bottled water on migration of phthalates into the water, initiated the interest in their presence in bottled water and the accompanying risk assessment. In this study, common Iranian brands of bottled water were screened for phthalates. The effect of storage temperature on selected target chemical concentrations was investigated. A toxicological risk assessment was conducted to determine the potential health risks associated with the consumption of the bottled water. Along with indirect exposure assessment, a human biomonitoring approach was applied to facilitate better human exposure assessment of individual phthalates and their mixtures providing important information for identifying exposure sources and the contribution of intake from bottled water to the total daily intake. Chapter 1 of the thesis presents an introduction to the topic, the toxicological properties of phthalates, risk assessment strategies and the regulatory status of phthalates. Chapter 2 of the thesis describes the development of a method to extract phthalates from bottled water by applying surface-functionalized magnetic particles (MPs) as the adsorbent used in Magnetic Solid-Phase Extraction (MSPE). Based on the results obtained, it was concluded that the MSPE-GC-MS method developed provides a new method for the determination of phthalates in water samples. To extend the work to real samples chapter 3 presents the occurrence and concentrations of common phthalates (dibutyl phthalate (DBP), butyl benzyl phthalate (BBP), and diethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP) ) in PET bottled water locally produced in the Iranian market and stored under various common storage conditions. According to the results obtained, an increase in temperature and/or in the duration of storage increases phthalate migration. The highest concentrations of all phthalates were observed when bottled water samples were kept at 40 °C for 45 days. DEHP in bottled water was the most abundant phthalate under all storage conditions, although the observed level of DEHP in the worst-case scenario (40 °C for 45 days) was still much lower than the DEHP maximum concentration limit (MCL) in bottled water (MCL= 6 µg/L) set by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (U.S. FDA). When comparing the concentrations of DBP, BBP and DEHP with initial levels in the bottled water, the results demonstrate that the release of phthalates was not substantial under all storage conditions, and especially minimal at low temperatures ( In chapter 4, concentrations of diethyl phthalate (DEP) were measured in bottled water kept under various storage conditions, similar as those used in chapter 3 for DEHP, DBP and BBP, and the resulting risks of consumption of this water for children but also for other age groups were evaluated. The results indicate that storage duration and storage temperature also influence the release of DEP from PET bottles into water. In comparison to the initial level of DEP in bottled water samples, the migration of DEP appeared not considerable under most storage conditions, especially at low temperatures ( children > lactating women > teenagers > adults > pregnant women. However, for all age groups, none of the individuals exceeds existing intake limit values for DEP. Due to the anti-androgenic activity of some phthalates, in chapter 5 the cumulative health risks in pregnant and lactating women posed by combined exposure to BBP, DBP, and DEHP via consumption of bottled water was estimated. To this end, hazard quotient (HQ) values, representing the margin between health based guidance values (EPA RfD values) and estimated exposures, and hazard index (HI) values, representing the sum of HQ values of individual phthalates, were determined. The results of the study showed that the HQ values for individual phthalate intake via bottled water consumption in pregnant and lactating women were much lower than 1, and cumulative risk assessment for combined phthalate exposure demonstrated that the HIs for anti-androgenic effects were also lower than 1 which implies that adverse effects are unlikely to occur. In chapter 6 of the thesis a systematic review method was used to investigate whether the phthalate exposure would be a factor contributing to the development of autism spectrum disorders (ASD). The results of this systematic review revealed that only a limited number of studies has addressed phthalates in relation to autism. A total of five studies met the inclusion criteria and were included in the review. Of the 5 studies, two studies were cohort studies both from the U.S.A. and three were case-control studies conducted in the U.S.A., Italy and Turkey. Because of the heterogeneity in the type of included studies, different methods of assessing exposure to phthalates and the use of different statistics for summarizing the results, a meta-analysis could not be performed to combine the results of included studies. The review showed equivocal evidence for a possible connection between exposure to phthalates and ASD. Further comprehensive research is needed with appropriate attention to exposure assessment and relevant pre and post-natal confounders. In the next step we set our goal to get better insight in the total phthalate exposure of Iranian children, and to assess the proportion of phthalate intake from bottled water to the total daily intake. This was done using biomonitoring based exposure assessment. Chapter 7 of the thesis shows the data on the levels of phthalate metabolites in the spot urine samples of children and adolescents. We applied a calculation model based on the creatinine-adjusted urinary metabolite concentrations to obtain the EDIs for DEHP, DBP and BBP. The EDI values thus obtained were compared to available health-based guidance values (RfD and TDI values based on anti-androgenic effects). Assuming additive effects, the cumulative risk for combined exposure were estimated for three phthalates based on anti-androgenicity as the critical effect. The results from the risk assessment suggest that Iranian children and adolescents are exposed to low levels of a mixture of these phthalates. Risk assessment indicates that not only the exposure to the single phthalates, but also the combined exposure would not raise a safety concern. However, people typically come into contact with several chemicals with anti-androgenic properties in addition to the investigated phthalates in this study, which may also contribute to combined anti-androgenic effects. This indicates that a risk assessment of combined exposure including other anti-androgenic chemicals would be required to determine whether combined exposure to anti-androgenic chemicals is below acceptable levels. Comparison of the exposure values obtained to those obtained based on indirect estimates in earlier chapters of the thesis, revealed that bottled water provides only a limited contribution to total daily phthalates exposure in Iran. Chapter 8 presents a discussion of the results obtained and also presents some perspectives for future research and risk management of exposure to phthalates in Iran.</p

European perspectives on Environmental Burden of Disease : Estimates for nine stressors in six European countries

The highest environment-related health benefits can be expected from policies that efficiently target environmental exposures having high contributions to the burden of disease (BoD) in the population. Such benefits are demonstrated for example by the smoking bans in public places that have shown significant population health improvements in many European countries. However, the health impacts of environmental stressors range from relatively mild psychological effects like annoyance to effects on morbidity such as asthma, cardiovascular diseases, cancer and premature mortality. This diversity of health effects challenges the comparison of the impacts of alternative policies. The objectives of the multinational European EBoDE-project (Environmental Burden of Disease in the European region) included updating previous environmental burden of disease (EBD) assessments, identifying stressors relevant for the European region, testing a harmonized EBD methodology in the participating countries, and developing and making available the methodology for other countries. The project has assessed the environmental burden of disease related to nine selected stressors across six countries: Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. The assessed stressors were: benzene, dioxins (including furans and dioxin-like PCBs), non-smokers exposure to second-hand smoke, formaldehyde, lead, transportation noise (including road, rail and air traffic), ozone, particulate matter (PM2.5) and radon. The stressors were selected based on their public health relevance, potential for high individual risks, public concern and/or large economical impacts. The environmental burden of disease is expressed in Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs), which are a summary measure of population health combining mortality and morbidity. Calculations were based on the most recent scientific evidence concerning population exposure and health effects, national exposure data and WHO burden of disease data. Even though the most recent scientific knowledge and data were used, many uncertainties and controversies remain. Results give only a crude ranking of environmental health impacts and need to be interpreted with caution. The results suggest that 3–7% of the burden of disease1 in the participating six countries is associated with the selected nine environmental stressors. Particulate matter (PM) is estimated to be associated with the highest disease burden (6 000 to 10 000 DALYs per million people2), followed by second-hand smoke, traffic noise and radon. Burden of disease estimates quantify the attributable health impacts of environmental exposures. However, due to background exposures from natural sources and practical limitations in removing anthropogenic pollution, the total attributable burden of disease cannot be directly interpreted as reduction potential. EBD estimates can be used to identify areas of high disease burden for more detailed analysis of the reduction potential by targeted policies. Quantitative methods like EBD and health impact assessment should be used to inform policy makers about the health benefits of specific policy measures