Sulfur mustard continued

The Army s interim RfD for sulfur mustard is 7 x 10 mg/kg per day. ORNL (1998) calculated that value on the basis of the lowest oral dose of sulfur mustard that produced forestomach lesions (epithelial acanthosis, which is an increase in the thickness of the stratum spinosum of the epithelial tissue of the forestomach) in rats. The lowest-observed-adverse-effect level (LOAEL) for that effect was 0.03 mg/kg per day in a two-generation reproductive study (Sasser et al. 1989a). In that study, male and female rats were administered sulfur mustard for 5 days per week for 15 weeks, daily for 3 weeks, and 4 days per week for 3 weeks. Because of this discontinuous dosing protocol, ORNL adjusted the LOAEL (LOAELajj) to calculate the doses for continuous exposures. That adjustment was done by calculating the total dose administered during the different exposure protocols ... 

Information on the potential carcinogenicity of sulfur mustard is available primarily from studies on rats and mice. McNamara et al. (1975) exposed SDW rats, ICR Swiss albino and A/J mice, rabbits, guinea pigs, and dogs to sulfur mustard vapors for varying exposure durations up to one year. The test animals were exposed to 0.001 mg HD/m continuously or to 0.1 mg HD/m for 6.5 hr followed by... 

The persistence of sulfur mustard in soil depends on the soil type, pH, moisture content, and whether the agent is at the soil surface or buried. Small (1984) reported that HD applied to the soil surfaee volatilized and would likely be the main route of HD loss (half-life about 30 min). However, if the soil was wet, hydrolysis would be the primary loss pathway. When sprayed onto soil, a vesieant action may persist for about 2 weeks but when the agent continually leaks into the soil vesicant action may be present after 3 years (DA, 1974). Rosenblatt et al. (1995) state that the persistenee of sulfur mustard in soil is due to the formation of oligomerie degradation products that coat... 

Smith, K.J., Hurst, C.G., Moeller, R.B., Skelton, H.G., Sidell, F.R. (1995). Sulfur mustard its continuing threat as a chemical warfare agent, the cutaneous lesions induced, progress in understanding its mechanism of action, its long-term health effects, and new developments for protection and therapy. J. Am. Acad. Dermatol. 32 16S-16. 

Decontamination of conventional wounds in a contaminated environment continues to be a major concern. Researchers have looked at the effect of bleach decontamination on damaged skin exposed to CWAs. Gold et al. (1994) evaluated the effects of water or diluted bleach (0.5%) as a wound decontaminant 2 min after hairless guinea pig was exposed to sulfur mustard. The study found that 0.5% hypochlorite and even water soaking for 5 min in a wound contaminated with sulfur mustard (20 mg/kg) cause greater necrosis than when no decontamination was carried out. This does not mean that the wound should not be decontaminated but rather that bleach soaking in the wound is not the route to decontaminant. 

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