Residential pesticide use during pregnancy among a cohort of urban minority women.

Abstract

Residential pesticide use is widespread in the United States. However, data are limited specific to use among minority populations. Nor are data available on the extent of pesticide exposure resulting from residential use during pregnancy. We have gathered questionnaire data on pesticide use in the home during pregnancy from 316 African-American and Dominican women residing in northern Manhattan and the South Bronx. Additionally, 72 women underwent personal air monitoring for 48 hr during their third trimester of pregnancy to determine exposure levels to 21 pesticides (19 insecticides and 2 fungicides). Of the women questioned, 266 of 314 (85%) reported that pest control measures were used in the home during pregnancy; 111 of 314 (35%) reported that their homes were sprayed by an exterminator, and of those, 45% said the spraying was done more than once per month. Most (>or= 90%) of the pesticide was used for cockroach control. Use of pest control measures increased significantly with the level of housing disrepair reported. Of the women monitored, all (100%) had detectable levels of three insecticides: the organophosphates diazinon (range, 2.0-6,010 ng/m3) and chlorpyrifos (range, 0.7-193 ng/m3) and the carbamate propoxur (range, 3.8-1,380 ng/m3), as well as the fungicide o-phenylphenol (range, 5.7-743 ng/m3). We also frequently detected the following four insecticides (47-83% of samples) but at lower concentrations: the pyrethroid trans-permethrin, piperonyl butoxide (an indicator of exposure to pyrethrins), and the organochlorines 1,1,1-trichloro-2,2-bis(p-chlorophenyl)ethane and chlordane. Thirty percent of the women had detectable levels of all eight pesticides. Exposures were generally higher among African Americans than among Dominicans. We detected other pesticides in <or= 10% of samples. Results show widespread prenatal pesticide use among minority women in this cohort. Diazinon exposures for some women may have exceeded health-based levels, and our findings support recent federal action to phase out residential use of this insecticide.

Comparative developmental neurotoxicity of organophosphates in vivo: Transcriptional responses of pathways for brain cell development, cell signaling, cytotoxicity and neurotransmitter systems

“…Accordingly, whereas all the organophosphates share cholinesterase as a target, they are likely to differ to a greater or lesser extent in their effects unrelated to that particular mechanism. Indeed, chlorpyrifos (CPF), the best-studied agent, affects brain development through diverse targets such as oxidative stress, cell signaling cascades, expression and function of nuclear transcription factors, and neuronal-glial cell interactions [42,73,86,87,89], mechanisms that may be shared in varying degrees by other organophosphates [1,67,73,75,86,87,91,110].…”

Socio-demographic characteristics of UK families using pesticides and weed-killers

“…This study was unable to investigate differences in usage by gender or between specific ethnic minorities as has been reported in other studies (Grieshop et al, 1992;Whyatt et al, 2002). The relative importance of maternal and partner factors may allow some tenuous inferences about gender differences.…”

“…An alternative incentive is the perceived need to use these products. The ALSPAC questionnaires did not enquire about the reasons for using pesticides and weed-killers but one might speculate that nonhomeowners might tend to live in poorer accommodation which might require greater usage to treat infestation (Whyatt et al, 2002). In fact the opposite was found F these families used less.…”

“…One pioneering study in the UK has suggested that those of higher socio-economic status are weakly associated with higher use (Grey, 2003) while inconsistent results have been reported in the USA. Three studies reported no consistent trends in pesticide use or exposure with age, income, ethnicity, education and housing type (Adgate et al, 2000(Adgate et al, , 2001Lu et al, 2001;Berkowitz et al, 2003) while another suggested differences between ethnic minority groups and higher use in poorer quality housing (Whyatt et al, 2002).…”

“…Most individuals would appear to be exposed to pesticides from one source or another according to a number of studies in the USA with metabolites or residues detectable in urine (93-99% of samples), in household dust (62-87%) or from air monitoring of the home environment (91-100%) (Adgate et al, 2001;Lu et al, 2001;Whyatt et al, 2002;Sexton et al, 2003;Colt et al, 2004). These exposures, potentially representing a cocktail of pesticide-active ingredients and inert chemicals, may act together in synergistic ways (Porter et al, 1999) so that even low doses may be of greater concern.…”