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Risk assessment of airborne agricultural pesticide exposure in humans in rural China

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Abstract

Continuous exposure to airborne pesticides causes their gradual accumulation in the human body, eventually posing a threat to human health. To the best of our knowledge, risk assessment study of pesticide non-occupational exposure to residents in agricultural areas has not been conducted in China. In this study, air samples (gas and dust) were collected from inside and outside residences of seven households and an area near the field in a grain-growing area (wheat and maize rotation) for eight months, and the pesticides present were examined both qualitatively and quantitatively. Using a 95% confidence interval, 9 out of 16 pesticides were detected, namely acetamiprid, acetochlor, atrazine, flucarbazone-sodium, imidacloprid, methyldisulfuron-methyl, nicosulfuron-methyl, pendimethalin, and beta-cyhalothrin, and their safety was subsequently evaluated. The results showed that the inhalation exposure of households to beta-cyhalothrin exceeded the acceptable range in the first residential, and the excess lifetime cancer risk of acetochlor inhalation exposure in six households and area around the field exceeds 1E−6, which highlights the need to strengthen preventive screening for cancer risk.

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Data availability

Datasets are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Funding

This work was supported by grants from the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2021YFD1400204).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory for Biology of Plant Diseases and Insect Pests, Institute of Plant Protection, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, 100193, China

    Yuzhao Hu, Shuai Wu, Changcai Wu, Jun Ning & Dongmei She

  2. Institute of Millet Crops of Hebei Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences, Cereal Crops Research Laboratory of Hebei Province, National Foxtail Millet Improvement Center, Shijiazhuang, 050035, China

    Zhimin Wei

Authors
  1. Yuzhao Hu
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  2. Shuai Wu
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  3. Changcai Wu
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  4. Zhimin Wei
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  5. Jun Ning
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  6. Dongmei She
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Contributions

Yuzhao Hu (first author) helped in conceptualization, methodology, software, investigation, formal analysis, writing—original draft; Shuai Wu was involved in data curation, writing—original draft; Changcai Wu contributed to visualization, investigation; Zhimin Wei helped in resources, supervision; Jun Ning helped in software, validation; Dongmei She (corresponding author) contributed to conceptualization, funding acquisition, resources, supervision, writing—review & editing.

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Correspondence to Dongmei She.

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Hu, Y., Wu, S., Wu, C. et al. Risk assessment of airborne agricultural pesticide exposure in humans in rural China. Environ Geochem Health 46, 117 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10653-024-01882-y

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