Widespread occurrence of benzophenone-type UV light filters in personal care products from China and the United States: an assessment of human exposure

Abstract

Benzophenone-3 (BP-3) is a sunscreen agent used in a variety of personal care products (PCPs) for the protection of human skin and hair from damage by ultraviolet (UV) radiation. Concerns have been raised over exposure of humans to BP-3, owing to the estrogenic potential of this compound. Nevertheless, the levels and profiles of BP-3 in PCPs and sources of exposure of humans to this estrogenic compound are not well-known. In this study, concentrations of BP-3 were determined in seven categories of 231 PCPs collected from several cities in China (n = 117) and the United States (U.S.) (n = 114), using high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS). BP-3 was found in the majority (81%) of the samples analyzed, at concentrations as high as 0.148%. The highest BP-3 concentrations (geometric mean [GM]: 548; median: 530 ng/g) were found in skin lotions (including sunscreen lotions), followed by makeup products (284; 221 ng/g). PCPs collected from the U.S. contained higher concentrations of BP-3 than those collected from China. On the basis of the concentrations measured and daily usage rates of PCPs, we estimated the daily intake of BP-3 through dermal absorption from the use of PCPs. The GM and 95th percentile exposure doses to BP-3 were 0.978 and 25.5 μg/day, respectively, for adult women in China, which were 2 orders of magnitude lower than those found for adult women in the U.S. (24.4 and 5160 μg/day). Skin lotions and face creams contributed to the preponderance of daily BP-3 exposures (>80%).