Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2008 Aug;73(1 Suppl):S246-51.
doi: 10.1016/j.chemosphere.2007.04.090. Epub 2008 May 20.

DDT and its metabolites in breast milk from the Madeira River basin in the Amazon, Brazil

Antonio Azeredo  1 , João P M Torres, Márlon de Freitas Fonseca, José Lailson Britto, Wanderley Rodrigues Bastos, Cláudio E Azevedo E Silva, Giselle Cavalcanti, Rodrigo Ornellas Meire, Paula N Sarcinelli, Luz Claudio, Steven Markowitz, Olaf Malm
Affiliations

DDT and its metabolites in breast milk from the Madeira River basin in the Amazon, Brazil

Antonio Azeredo et al. Chemosphere. 2008 Aug.

Abstract

Until the 1990s the 1,1,1-trichloro-bis-2,2'-(4chlorophenyl) ethane (DDT) was sprayed in the walls of the house along the Madeira River basin, Brazilian Amazon, a region well known for its large number of malaria cases. In 1910, Oswaldo Cruz described the presence of malaria in 100% of the population living in some localities from the Madeira River basin. Data available in the literature point to the DDT contamination in fishes captured in Madeira River region. Fish is the major source of dietary protein to these people. DDT tends to accumulate in lipid rich tissues and is being eliminated by different events, including lactation. Considering the importance of feeding breast milk to the children, the associated risks of DDT exposure via breast milk intake to children must be assessed. This is the main objective of this work: to analyse the presence of the p,p'-DDT and its metabolites p,p'-DDE and p,p'-DDD in 69 human milk samples and to estimate the intake of DDT and its metabolite in terms of total DDT (total DDT=p,p'-DDE+p,p'-DDD+p,p'-DDT). All the samples showed contamination with DDT and its metabolites ranging from 25.4 to 9361.9 ng of total DDT/g of lipid (median=369.6 ng of total DDT/g of lipid) and 8.7% of the estimated daily intake (EDI), in terms of total DDT, which was higher than the acceptable daily intake proposed by the WHO.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Sampling area.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Total DDT in different localities of the Madeira River.
Figure 3
Figure 3
p,p′-DDE/p,p′-DDT rates in individual milk samples from Madeira River.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Bakken AF, Siep M. Insecticides in human breast milk. Acta Pædiatr Scand. 1976;65:535–539. - PubMed
    1. Beretta M, Dick T. Organochlorine Compounds in Human Milk, Porto Alegre, Brazil. Bull Environ Contam Toxicol. 1994;53:357–360. - PubMed
    1. Berlin JRCM, Kacew S, Lawrence R, Lakind JS, Campbell R. Criteria for chemical selection for programs on human milk surveillance and research for environmental chemicals. J Toxicol Environ Health Part A. 2002;65:1839–1851. - PubMed
    1. Cruz OG. Madeira-Mamoré railway company. Considerações geraes sobre as condições sanitárias do Rio Madeira pelo Dr. Oswaldo Gonçalves Cruz. Papelaria Americana, Rio de Janeiro. 1910
    1. D’Amato C, Torres JPM, Malm O, Bastos W, Cláudio L, Markowitz S. DDT in fishes from four different Amazon sites: exposure assessment for breast feeding infants. Organohalogen Compd. 2004;66:2483–2490.

Publication types