5&5: News and Science Highlights from February 2012

“Probable link” between pregnancy-induced hypertension and PFOA contamination. Explanation of one of the legal “probable-cause” findings which are the scientific basis of determination of DuPont’s liabilities with regard to contaminating a waterway with PFOA.

Obesogens: an environmental link to obesity. Accessible and comprehensive EHP cover feature looking at the mechanisms of action and potential culprits in the obesogen hypothesis.

Cashew nut pesticide linked to blood cancers in Indian children. Report on how a widely-banned pesticide, still extensively used in cashew nut and other cash crop plantations in developing countries, has been found in the bone marrow of children suffering from blood cancers in the areas using the pesticide.

Long-awaited dioxins report released; EPA says low doses risky but most people safe. After 21 years of wrangling over health threats, uncertain science and industry pressure, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Friday released its health assessment of dioxins, concluding there are potentially serious effects even at very low levels of exposure.

Call for new approach on endocrine disruptors. The final version of an EU-commissioned report recommends EDCs be treated as a distinct regulatory category (as for CMRs and PBTs), and cautions that existing, internationally-agreed and validated test protocols capture only a limited range of potential ED effects.

Urinary Bisphenol: A Concentration and Risk of Future Coronary Artery Disease in Apparently Healthy Men and Women. The associations found here between higher BPA exposure and incident CAD show similar trends to cross-sectional findings in the more highly exposed NHANES respondents. Study sponsored by the British Heart Foundation and published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Prenatal Exposure to PFOA and Risk of Overweight at 20 Years of Age. Propsective study replicating in humans findings in mice that PFOA exposure increases weight gain and adiposity, with women gestationally exposed to PFOA more likely to be obese at 20 years.

Solvent exposures and Parkinson Disease risk in twins. US epidemiological research finding that exposure to trichloroethylene, the most common organic contaminant in US groundwater, and PERC and CCl4 (also ubiquitous in the environment) may increase risk of PD.

Concentrations and speciation of polybrominated diphenyl ethers in human amniotic fluid. Although PBDE accumulation in humans has been noted since the 1970s, this is the first to date which identifies levels in amniotic fluid. PBDE congeners were identified in all samples.

Birth Weight and Prenatal Exposure to PCBs and DDE: A Meta-analysis within 12 European Birth Cohorts. Low-level exposure to PCB (or correlated exposures) impairs fetal growth, suggests this large meta-analysis, with the effects of PCB 153 exposure on birth weight equivalent to the effects of a pregnant mother smoking 10 cigarettes a day.

Memories of John Newby from his friend and academic mentor, Vyvyan Howard

It is with sadness that we announce the sudden passing of John Newby, CPES’ enormously capable Medical Information Scientist. CPES funded John’s Masters degree and here Vyvyan Howard recalls their time together at university:

I met John after he had received his degree. It was clear that he was heading for a First Class Honours degree before he was struck down in his prime by systemic sclerosis. John was one of the brightest students that the Department of Anatomy and Human Biology had had. He wanted dearly to continue his academic studies in biological science at a postgraduate level, but it was clear that because of the disabilities resulting from his condition that laboratory research would not be possible. We managed to find money from various charitable sources to initially study for a Masters degree which was subsequently transferred to a full Doctor of Philosophy.

John had to retrain completely and study the field of epidemiology and environmental chemistry. This he did with gusto and it was clear to me that his illness had, mercifully, not affected his exceptional intellect in the slightest. The result was that he developed a new statistical index for determining whether the average age of onset of a cancer within a population was becoming progressively younger or older.

In his thesis he demonstrated that for cancers of the breast, testis and prostate the age of onset was receding, that is people were getting the disease at a younger age, on average. Many epidemiologists have taken an interest in this since we published the paper. It will be part of John’s legacy to see the modelling, that he started, refined into a powerful tool that could be put to use to help modify public health policy in the future.

John Newby was an exceptional man and it has been a privilege to know him and to work with him. Despite having been dealt an awful blow to his health and wellbeing when in the prime of his life, he always remained positive, looking for the next challenge.

We went together to a conference on the Aegean island of Kos a good number of years ago. I was his ‘chariot’ driver as we negotiated busy airports. His wry sense of humour, on that and many other occasions, will remain with me and I will miss him badly.

Vyvyan Howard. Coleraine, 24^th October  2011

5&5: News and science highlights from March

News

Cancer rise and sperm quality fall ‘due to chemicals’: “The best working theory we have to explain why sperm counts may be declining is that chemicals from food or the environment are affecting the development of testicles of boys in the womb or in their early years of life,” says Dr Allan Pacey, University of Sheffield (UK).

Scientists want to help regulators decide safety of chemicals: The NYT reports on groups representing 40,000 researchers and clinicians which are urging federal agencies responsible for the safety of chemicals to examine the subtle impact a chemical might have on the human body, rather than simply ask whether it is toxic.

Food sold in recycled cardboard packaging ‘poses risk’: Leading food manufacturers are changing their packaging because of health concerns about boxes made from recycled cardboard, reports the BBC.  Recycled cardboard can be contaminated with toxic inks.

UCSF Team Shows How to Make Skinny Worms Fat and Fat Worms Skinny: Researchers exploring human metabolism at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) have uncovered a handful of chemical compounds that regulate fat storage in worms, offering a new tool for understanding obesity and finding future treatments for diseases.

Chemical-free pest management cuts rice waste: Science Daily describes a “novel way of bringing sustainable, pesticide-free processes to protect stored rice and other crops from insects and fungi can drastically cut losses of stored crops and help increase food security for up to 3 billion daily rice consumers” – not to mention reducing risks to health posed by pesticide use.

Science

Combating Environmental Causes of Cancer: An important contribution in the New England Journal of Medicine from Harvard’s David Christiani, MD, MPH, emphasising the importance of improving our understanding of how chemicals in the environment may be contributing to cancer incidence.

Several current-use, non-PBDE brominated flame retardants are highly bioaccumulative: Study finding that non-PBDE BFRs have similar bioaccumulative properties as PBDEs. PBDEs are currently being phased out due to environmental concerns – it may be the case that their substitutes are no better.

Endocrine disruptors: from endocrine to metabolic disruption. A good review of endocrine disrupting compounds and metabolism, including diabetes, obesity, metabolic syndrome, and more. It includes both epidemiological and mechanistic studies, and is particularly helpful for not assuming detailed knowledge on the part of the reader.

Food Packaging and Bisphenol A and Bis(2-Ethylhexyl) Phthalate Exposure: Findings from a Dietary Intervention: Evidence that exposure to BPA and DEHP can be substantially reduced by restricting the consumption of packaged food.

Environmental pollutants and type 2 diabetes: a review of mechanisms that can disrupt beta cell function: A new review of the association between chemical exposure and diabetes, finding that clear evidence that “some environmental pollutants affect pancreatic beta cell function.”