Perfluorinated organic compounds in human blood serum and seminal plasma: a study of urban and rural tea worker populations in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Concentrations and accumulation of 13 fluorinated organic compounds (FOCs) in human sera and seminal plasma were measured in an Asian developing country, Sri Lanka. Six of the FOCs, PFOS (perfluorooctanesulfonate), PFHS (perfluorohexanesulfonate), PFUnA (perfluoroundecanoic acid), PFDA (perfluorodecanoic acid), PFNA (perfluorononanoic acid) and PFOA (perfluorooctanoic acid), were detected in all of the sera samples. Measurable quantities of two main perfluorosulfonates, PFOS and PFHS, were found in all seminal plasma samples. The detection frequency of the predominant perfluoroalkylcarboxylate, PFOA, in seminal plasma was >70%. Accumulation of PFOS in sera was significantly positively correlated with PFOA, PFHS and PFNA. Positive linear regressions were also found between PFNA and PFUnA and PFNA and PFDA suggesting that these compounds may have a similar origin of exposure and accumulation. Significantly positive associations were observed for partitioning of both PFOS and PFNA between sera and seminal plasma. The accumulation of FOCs was not significantly different in sera from Colombo (urban population) and Talawakele (rural conventional tea workers). However, the Haldummulla population (rural organic tea workers) had relatively lower exposure to FOCs compared to the other two groups, urban and rural conventional tea workers. Concentrations of FOCs in Sri Lanka were similar to those reported for industrialized countries suggesting that human exposure to such chemicals is widespread even in developing countries. The novel finding of FOCs in human seminal plasma implies that further studies are needed to determine whether long-term exposure in humans can result in reproductive impairments.

Perfluorooctanesulfonate and Related Fluorochemicals in Human Blood Samples from China

“…Previous studies have reported that PFOA is the PFC that occurred at the second greatest concentrations in human blood (serum and whole blood) samples (12,13,20). However, in the present study, concentrations of PFOA were fourth highest among the PFCs measured.…”

“…Our test results showed that the widely used surrogate 13 C-PFOA ( 13 C-PFOA from Perkin-Elmer) contained significant amounts of PFBA and PFPeA. Hence, 13 C-PFOA was used only for checking the overall recovery of target chemicals during the analytical procedure. Due to the problem of contaminants in the standards, recoveries of native chemicals were tested in a series of preliminary experiments instead of using internal standards.…”

Trends of polyfluoroalkyl compounds in marine biota and in humans

“…PFOS, PFOA and PFHxS concentrations in human blood (*, serum data, or whole blood data converted to serum basis by multiplying by a factor of 2) of the general population (male adults; except for Sweden: female adults) in several cities all over the world (2000-05); data adapted from references that are cited following the data: China [41] ; USA, Poland, South Korea, Belgium, Malaysia, Brazil, Japan (2002), Colombia, Italy, India [26] ; Canada [160] ; Japan (2003) [138] ; Australia [161] ; Norway [39] ; Sweden [51] ; Germany [162] ; Sri Lanka. [163] Chinese cities no age-related differences were observed. [41] A plausible explanation for this inconsistency is not yet known.…”

Effects of age, gender and region on serum concentrations of perfluorinated compounds in general population of Henan, China

“…No statistically significant difference was found in PFCs concentrations between rural and urban regions in an Australia study (Karrman et al, 2006), while higher PFOS and PFOA concentrations in urban areas compared to rural areas could be seen in Japan and Sri Lanka (Harada et al, 2004;Guruge et al, 2005). Another study conducted in Germany reported that PFOA concentrations were significantly decreased in urban populations comparing to populations living in the rural area, but there was no significant difference in PFOS concentrations between urban and rural populations (Fromme et al, 2007).…”