Temporal Trends of Polybrominated Diphenyl Ethers
(PBDEs) in the Blood of Newborns from New York State during 1997 through
2011: Analysis of Dried Blood Spots from the Newborn Screening Program
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Abstract
Polybrominated
diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are ubiquitous environmental
pollutants, and on a global basis, North American populations are
exposed to the highest doses of PBDEs. In response to the exponential
increase in human exposure to PBDEs during the late 1990s, some PBDE
formulations were phased out from production in the early 2000s. The
effectiveness of the phase-out of commercial penta-BDE and octa-BDE
mixtures in 2004 in the U.S. on human exposure levels is not known.
Dried blood spots (DBSs), collected for the newborn screening program
(NSP) in the U.S., are a valuable resource for the elucidation of
trends in exposure to environmental pollutants in newborns. In this
study, seven PBDE congeners were determined by gas chromatography-high
resolution mass spectrometry (GC-HRMS) in archived DBS samples (in
total, 51 blood spot composites from 1224 newborns) collected from
newborns in New York State (NYS) from 1997 to 2011. The most frequently
detected PBDE congener was BDE-47, with a detection rate (DR) of 86%,
followed by BDE-99 (DR: 45%) and BDE-100 (DR: 43%). The mean concentrations
determined during 1997 through 2011 in the whole blood of newborns
were 0.128, 0.040, and 0.012 ng/mL for BDE-47, -99, and -100, respectively.
A significant correlation was found among the concentrations of three
major congeners (<i>p</i> < 0.001). PBDE concentrations
were similar during 1997 through 2002 and, thereafter, decreased significantly,
which was similar to the trends observed for perfluorinated compounds
(PFCs) in DBS samples. Occurrence of PBDEs in the whole blood of newborns
confirms that these compounds do cross the placental barrier