Nerve agents industrial exposure

The six countries to have declared chemical weapons are required to destroy some 8.5 million items, including munitions and containers. As of April 2005,167 countries had joined the OPCW. ° All declared chemical weapons production capacity had been inactivated, with two-thirds of the declared facilities either verifiably destroyed or converted for peaceful purposes. With respect to chemical weapons, the inventory of all declared stockpiles had been completed and verified, but less than one-quarter of the declared 8.5 million chemical weapon munitions had been verifiably destroyed. Of the 70,000 tonnes of declared chemical weapons agents, only about 15 per cent had been verifiably destroyed just a tiny drop of nerve agent the size of a pin head can kill an adult within minutes of exposure. Almost 5,000 industrial facilities around the world are liable for inspection the OPCW had conducted almost 2,000 inspections at 170 military and 600 industrial sites in 68 countries. 

It is important to realize that, other than industrial standards (i.e., TWAs and IDLHs), the doses listed in this handbook were developed for military operations and are not appropriate for use in determining acceptable exposure of civilians. In fact, die current levels are actually offensive concentrations that must be established in an aggressive action in order to facilitate the desired impacts rather than defensive concentrations used to protect allied soldiers. The U.S. Army is currently developing defensive exposure limits for most of the common nerve agents and for sulfur mustard gas. Proposals for these exposure limits are included in the Agent Index. They are located below the current lethal levels and are identified by placing brackets around the proposed [defensive exposure limits].118... 

The toxicity of anti-ChEs led to their development as CWAs, with the most recent example being the Syrian use of nerve agents to oppress in-land citizens (Sample, 2013). This and the effects of daily life exposure to anti-ChEs in agriculture and industry led to the development of detection methods and therapeutic agents to prevent the lethal effects of anti-ChEs (Periasamy et al., 2009 Masson, 2011 Worek and Thiermann, 2013). 

Nondietary sources of cyanide include sodium nitro-prusside (a hypotensive agent), succinonitrile (an antidepressant agent), acrylonitrile (used in the plastic industry and as a fumigant to kill dry-wood termites), and tobacco smoke. Chronic exposure to cyanogenic compounds leads to toxic manifestations such as demyelination, lesions of the optic nerves, ataxia (failure of muscle coordination), and depressed thyroid functions. This last effect arises from accumulation of thiocyanate, the detoxified product of cyanide in the body (see below). Thiocyanate inhibits the active uptake of iodide by the thyroid gland and, therefore, the formation of thyroid hormones (Chapter 33). 

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