Development of a new categorization system for pesticides exposure to support harmonized reporting between EU Member States.

OBJECTIVES: European legislation requires reporting from Member States on acute poisoning incidents involving pesticides. However, standard rules for data collection and reporting have not yet been set out. The new categorization system presented in this paper is aimed at enabling Member States to gather comparable data and provide standard reporting on pesticide poisoning exposures. MATERIALS AND METHODS: European Regulations providing separate official categorization of biocidal and plant protection pesticides, were used as a basis to build up a unified pesticide categorization and coding system. Data on selected pesticide exposures collected by Poison Control Centres in six EU countries were reviewed, categorized and reported according to the proposed system. RESULTS: The resulting pesticide categorization system has two dimensions. The first part identifies the main category of use, i.e. biocide/plant protection pesticide/unknown, and the secondary category of use, e.g. Rodenticides, Insecticides and acaricides. The second part of the system is organized into two levels: level one identifies chemical grouping, e.g. Coumarins, Pyrethrins/pyrethroids, while level two identifies the active compound by using its Chemical Abstract Service Registry Number. The system was used to provide a unified categorization to compare exposures to plant protection and biocidal Rodenticides and Pyrethrins/pyrethroids Insecticides and acaricides identified by six EU member states. CONCLUSION: The developed pesticide categorization system was successfully applied to data extracted from different databases and was able to make the required information comparable. The data reported filling in common templates containing a pre-ordinate list of active compounds categorized according the proposed system, highlighted different capabilities in data collection and recording, showing that some of the collaborating centres were not able to distinguish between main categories of pesticide products or provide information on active compounds. The results indicate that a special effort should be dedicated to support detailed data recording at national level. Providing common tools to systematically report to the EU Commission hazardous exposures to pesticides, as well as to other selected categories of products, could allow for data comparability between Member States and greatly improve post marketing surveillance and alerting systems in Europe.

Exposure to pesticides and time to pregnancy among female greenhouse workers.

The aim of the study was to evaluate the possible effect of maternal work in greenhouses, as characterised by potentially high exposure to pesticides, on female fertility. Nine hundred and ten women active in 34 greenhouse flower growing enterprises in 1998-2000, with at least one pregnancy, and aged less than 50 years were identified. Seven hundred and seventeen (79%) agreed to be interviewed and reported 1699 pregnancies, of which 713 had complete information on time to pregnancy and occupation. These pregnancies were classified as exposed or non-exposed according to the maternal occupation in greenhouses at the moment of conception and analysed using logistic regression and survival analysis methods. We found a slightly higher proportion of pregnancies with delayed conception (more than 6 months) in the exposed group. However, after adjustment for confounding variables, the estimated hazard ratio for reduced fertility among the exposed was not significantly different to that of the non-exposed pregnancies (HR=0.96, 95%CI: 0.81, 1.13). A significant reduction in fecundability was observed in older women and with a daily consumption of one or more alcoholic beverages or cups of tea.

Health risk and occupation in agricultural settings in Italy.

In Italy several studies have examined the association between cancer and occupation in agricultural settings, focusing on exposure to pesticides. Most of the cohort studies evaluated cancer mortality in licensed pesticide users. Many case-control studies considered hematolymphopoietic malignancies, and the most recent studies observed increased risks for use of specific chemical classes of pesticides. Preliminary data on pesticide-related illnesses must be taken into account, and a national surveillance system should be implemented to identify areas at high risk and to promote exposure-control programs.

[Mortality among workers in a cigarette factory in Lucca (Tuscany)]. / Studio di mortalità degli addetti alla manifattura del tabacco di Lucca.

Aim of the present cohort study was to evaluate the mortality pattern among workers in a cigar and cigarette factory in Lucca, Italy. The study followed 2341 workers (1585 women and 756 men) registered in the company payrolls and employed for at least six months from 1 January 1960 through 1 January 1994. Follow-up was between the start of employment in the factory and 1 June 2002 (totally 74363,5 person-years). For both sexes, all-causes mortality was lower than expected (men: SMR= 0.8; CI95% 0.7-0.9; 158 deaths; women: SMR= 0.9; CI95% 0.8-1.0; 584 deaths) and no excess of mortality was reported for all malignant neoplasms. Among female workers, the frequency of deaths from pleural cancer was elevated at a statistically significant level (SMR= 6.0; CI95% 2.4-12.6; 5 deaths). One death for pleural cancer also occurred among men versus 0.4 expected. All women deceased from pleural cancer had been working in tobacco manufacturing for at least 30 years. The excess of pleural neoplasms reported in this study suggests the opportunity to evaluate the risk due to asbestos use in many manifacturing industries, especially where steam was used for extractive or warming purpose.

Prostate cancer and exposure to pesticides in agricultural settings.

Our study evaluates the association between prostate cancer and exposure to pesticides in agricultural settings in Italy. The data were derived from a hospital-based multi-site case-control study carried out in 5 rural areas between 1990-92. In our study, 124 new cases of prostate cancer were ascertained and interviewed, along with 659 cancer controls. A team of agronomists assessed past exposure to pesticides by using a checklist of 100 chemical families and 217 compounds applied from 1950-85 in the areas considered. The association between prostate cancer and different occupational risk factors was measured by maximum likelihood estimation of the odds ratio, controlling for potential confounders. "Ever been employed in agriculture" was associated with a 40% increased risk (OR = 1.4, 95% CI = 0.9-2.0). Prostate cancer was also related positively to food and tobacco (OR= 2.1, 95% CI = 1.1-4.1), and chemical products (OR = 2.2, 95% CI = 0.7-7.2) industries. The analyses carried out to estimate the association between different types of pesticides and prostate cancer showed increased risks among farmers exposed to organochlorine insecticides and acaricides (OR = 2.5, 95% CI = 1.4-4.2), more specifically to the often contemporary used compounds DDT (OR = 2.1, 95% CI = 1.2-3.8), and dicofol (OR = 2.8, 95% CI = 1.5-5.0), whose effects could not be well separated.

[Testicular tumors in Italy: historical trends, geographic differences, and etiological hypotheses]. / Il tumore testicolare in Italia: andamento storico, differenze territoriali e ipotesi eziologiche.

Testicular cancer is a rare tumour. Its incidence has been increasing in many parts of the world during the last decades. This cancer has an unusual age distribution with one peak in incidence in young adults (aged 20-39) and a second peak in over 60. On the basis of the Italian Bureau of Statistics, mortality rate was higher in northern regions of the country compared to southern ones, up to the beginning of the 1980's. However, the progressive decline in mortality in all regions eliminated the geographical differences in recent years. Incidence rates obtained from the existing cancer Registries, confirm a strong geographical gradient, with higher rates in the North (ex. 5.1/100,000 in Parma in 1988-92) than in the South (ex. 1.1/100,000 in Ragusa in 1988-92). The comparison between incidence rates of two recent periods (1983-87 and 1988-92), showed an increase in most of the provinces for which data were available. The age distribution curve showed that testicular cancer occurs after puberty, with a peak in incidence among 30-34 year olds, and after the age of 60. These observations suggest the possible causative role of some environmental exposures. Epidemiological studies have found an association between some occupational exposures in industrial and agricultural settings and testicular cancer. Moreover some studies have found an association between parental occupation and testicular cancer in the offspring. However, the aetiology of testicular cancer is still poorly understood.