title: Prenatal exposure to organochlorine pesticides and infant birth weight in China.
abstract: In utero exposure to organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) is thought to be potentially harmful to fetal development. We aimed to investigate the associations of maternal and cord serum OCPs levels with infant birth weight in China. In this study, we measured serum levels of 18 OCPs in 81 mother-infant pairs, including DDT, hexachlorocyclohexanes (BHC), hexachlorobenzene (HCB), heptachlors, chlordanes, endosulfan-I, and mirex using a high-resolution-gas-chromatography with high-resolution-mass-spectrometry method. We found that p,p'-DDE and β-BHC had the highest detection rate in both maternal and cord blood serum (97.2% and 96.7%, respectively), followed by HCB (93.0%, 51.7%), p,p'-DDT (88.7%, 36.7%), and p,p'-DDD (83.1%, 60.0%). Among all OCPs, the concentration of p,p'-DDE was the highest (mothers geometric mean (GM): 203.54ngg(-1), newborns GM: 116.14ngg(-1)), followed by HCB (70.62ngg(-1), 65.16ngg(-1)), and β-BHC (67.67ngg(-1), 33.39ngg(-1)). Multiple linear regression analyses showed that each 1ngg(-1) increment of cord serum p,p'-DDE, total DDT, and β-BHC was associated with a 0.10g, 0.10g, and 0.92g decrease in infant birth weight, respectively, and as the cord serum concentrations of p,p'-DDT, p,p'-DDD, HCB and mirex increased, the infant birth weight was also decreased, although the associations were not statistically significant due to the relatively small sample size. These results suggest that p,p'-DDE, β-BHC, and HCB were the predominant OCPs in the serum of Chinese pregnant women and cord blood of their newborns. Prenatal exposure to DDT, β-BHC, HCB, and mirex were associated with a decrease in birth weight, but these results need validation in larger sample-sized studies.
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA; School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, Hubei, China.
authors.forename: Huan
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.affiliation: Institute for Environmental Health and Related Product Safety, China CDC, Beijing 100021, China.
authors.forename: Yinlong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Jin
authors.affiliation: Institute for Environmental Health and Related Product Safety, China CDC, Beijing 100021, China.
authors.forename: Yibin
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Leaderer
authors.affiliation: Institute for Environmental Health and Related Product Safety, China CDC, Beijing 100021, China.
authors.forename: Shaobin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
authors.forename: Theodore R
authors.initials: TR
authors.lastname: Holford
authors.affiliation: Gansu Provincial Maternity and Child Care Hospital, Lanzhou 730050, Gansu, China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Qiu
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
authors.forename: Yawei
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Beijing Fentail Women and Children's Hospital, Beijing 100067, China.
authors.forename: Kunchong
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Shi
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.affiliation: Xiamen City Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Xiamen 361021, China.
authors.forename: Jianjun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Niu
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
authors.forename: Bryan A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Bassig
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430030, Hubei, China.
authors.forename: Shunqing
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: Wuhan City Children's Hospital, Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Bin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Institute for Environmental Health and Related Product Safety, China CDC, Beijing 100021, China.
authors.forename: Yonghong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA; School of Public Health, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China.
authors.forename: Xiaobin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA; Office for Cancer Research and Control, Cancer Hospital of Henan Province, Zhengzhou 450008, China.
authors.forename: Qiong
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, USA. Electronic address: tongzhang.zheng@yale.edu.
authors.forename: Tongzhang
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Zheng
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001724:Birth Weight / Q000187:drug effects*; D002681:China; D003634:DDT / Q000097:blood; D003633:Dichlorodiphenyl Dichloroethylene / Q000097:blood; D004726:Endosulfan / Q000097:blood; D005260:Female; D005312:Fetal Blood / Q000737:chemistry; D006581:Hexachlorobenzene / Q000097:blood; D001556:Hexachlorocyclohexane / Q000097:blood; D006801:Humans; D006843:Hydrocarbons, Chlorinated / Q000097:blood*; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D018811:Maternal Exposure; D008431:Maternal-Fetal Exchange; D008917:Mirex / Q000097:blood; D010575:Pesticides / Q000097:blood*; D011247:Pregnancy; D011297:Prenatal Exposure Delayed Effects / Q000139:chemically induced*; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D006843:Hydrocarbons, Chlorinated; D010575:Pesticides; D003633:Dichlorodiphenyl Dichloroethylene; D006581:Hexachlorobenzene; D001556:Hexachlorocyclohexane; D003634:DDT; D004726:Endosulfan; D008917:Mirex
keywords: Birth weight; Dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane; Hexachlorobenzene; Organochlorine pesticides; Prenatal exposure; β-Hexachlorocyclohexane