Cancer reproductive system

Trace metals (arsenic, cadmium, chromium, copper, nickel, lead, mercury, zinc) Industrial and municipal wastewaters runoff from urban areas and landfill erosion of contaminated soils and sediments atmospheric deposition Toxic effects including birth defects, reproductive failure, cancer, and systemic poisoning. 

Organometaiiic compounds (tributyitin, tetraethyi iead) Anti-fouiing paints, gasoiine additive Toxic effects inciuding birth defects, reproductive faiiure, cancer, and systemic poisoning. 

PVC can also contain phthalates, plasticizers that make materials flexible. Phthalates have been linked to cancer, kidney damage, and problems with the reproductive system. 

The most promising alternatives were synthetic pyrethroids. The pyrethroids, developed as derivatives of naturally occurring pyrethrum, cause hyperexcitation, aggressiveness, incoordination, whole-body tremor, and seizures. Acute exposure in humans, usually resulting from skin exposure due to poor handling procedures, usually resolves within 24 hours. While not particularly toxic to mammals, they can cause an allergic skin response in humans. Some pyrethroids may cause cancer, reproductive or developmental effects, or endocrine system effects. 

Certain household products contain ingredients that can cause long-term or delayed chronic health effects such as cancer, reproductive effects, nervous system effects,... 

Deligeoroglou E, Michailidis E, Creatsas G. Oral contraceptives and reproductive system cancer. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2003 997 199-208. 

It is argued that DRCs induce various toxic effects such as cancer in animal bodies (Birnbaum, 1994). Furthermore, /x/Z-DDE and p-HCH, the compounds that are there generally abundant in human breast milk, have been reported as an androgen antagonist and environmental estrogen, respectively (Keice et al., 1995 Willett et al., 1998). These observations imply that abundance of POPs in human breast milk may adversely affect development and reproductive systems of Asian children. However, it is difficult to draw any firm conclusion from Table 18.2 whether adverse effects by POPs have already occurred in Asian infants, because TDIs used here are estimated on the basis of life span exposure. Not only TDIs from life span but also TDIs of POPs estimated from breast-feeding period may be needed (LaKind et al., 2001). 

Mechanisms for the major effects of DEHP are discussed in this section. In animals, these effects include hepatotoxicity and alterations of the male reproductive system. In rodents, particularly rats and mice, hepatotoxicity leads to liver cancer if exposure is sustained therefore, the mechanisms of liver effects and cancer are discussed together. An exhaustive discussion on mechanisms of action is beyond the scope of this document. Rather, the information below is intended only as a summary of the most important... 

Reproductive toxicity Male or female reproductive system Decreased libido and impotence Infertility Interrupted pregnancy (abortion, fetal death, premature delivery) Infant death or childhood morbidity Altered sex ratio and multiple births Chromosome abnormalities and birth defects Childhood cancer... 

What of the effects in humans While there is evidence, some of it controversial, that changes have occurred in the reproductive systems of humans in various countries throughout the world over the last fifty years or so, ascribing these changes to particular chemicals, or even to chemicals at all, has been difficult. There has been an increase in testicular cancer as well as breast cancer since 1945, particularly in certain countries. Data from studies of populations in some countries, for example Finland, have indicated that sperm counts and the quality of the sperm in males have declined over the same time period, but by no means aU studies have found this and some have found the reverse. In some places there has been an apparent increase in disorders of the male reproductive system such as... 

Effects on the male reproductive system can also be produced by substances that interfere with male hormones, so-called anti-androgens. DDE is one such chemical, but attempts to correlate DDE levels in human breast fat tissue with the incidence of breast cancer have produced equivocal results. Dioxin shows significant anti-oestrogenic activity, but after the accident at Seveso a decreased incidence of breast cancer was observed in those who had been exposed. 

Gradishar WJ, Schilsky RL. Effects of cancer treatment on the reproductive system. Crit Rev Oncol Hematol 1988 8(2) 153-71. 

Chronic inhalation exposure in rats produces nasal cancer. In addition, thyroid cancers and effects on the male reproductive system have been reported in laboratory animals chronically exposed to vinyl acetate. 

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