Environmental exposure to metals of newborns, infants and young children

Anthropogenic emissions, such as those from combustion of fossil fuel, wast e incineration and industrial use, contribute to higher levels of metal pol lutants, including Cd, Pb and Sb, in the urban environment. These widesprea d and persistent environmental pollutants have the potential for developmen tal and reproductive toxicity. Health risks are particularly associated wit h exposure in utero and the early years of life, since the developing organ ism is at greater risk from permanent damage, and both absosption and reten tion can be considerably greater in infants than adults. In order to assess risk to humans, the information on environmental levels of pollutants (env ironmental monitoring) should be integrated with information on biomarkers of exposure, effect or susceptibility in biological fluids or tissues (biol ogical monitoring). The analysis of tissue from the target organ obtained a t autopsy provides a direct record of the accumulation of toxins and allows temporal and geographical trends to be studied. Few literature reports on tissue content of potentially toxic elements include data on newborns and y oung children since collections of autopsy samples in this age range are ra re. Existing data are sometime questionable, because of inadequate sensitiv ity of the analytical techniques, insufficient control of contamination and lack of validation. Our recent work aimed to establish reliable reference values for the content of Cd, Pb and Sb in the liver of pediatric subjects. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.