Biomonitoring of Urinary Organic and Inorganic Arsenic in Four Different Polluted Areas in Italy

Introduction The exposure assessment to low-moderate levels of environmental arsenic, As, and defining markers of exposure for surveillance in polluted areas represent challenging objectives for research and public health. Materials and Methods A Human Biomonitoring Survey on As, funded by the Ministry of Health (CCM), was carried out in four polluted areas: Amiata and Viterbo with anthropogenic sources, Taranto and Gela with industrial sources. 271 subjects, 132 men, aged 20-44, were randomly sampled stratifing by area, gender and age classes. Individual data on Residential history, Socio-economic status, Environmental and occupational exposure, Life style, dietary habits were collected by questionnaire; concentration of iAs, MMA, DMA in urine was measured. The distributions of iAs and iAs+MMA+DMA were described by area and gender, by geometric mean GM, percentiles, SD. Multiple Regression analysis was performed to evaluate the association between As level and dichotomy variables; GM Ratios (GMR) were calculated. Results High variability of As within and among areas was observed. Gela and Taranto samples had higher iAs concentration (GM 3,1 and 3.3 µg/L), compared to Viterbo (GM 1.9 µg/L) Amiata (GM 0.9 µg/L). Subjects with iAs > 1.5 µg/L and iAs+MMA+DMA>15 µg/L were 137 (50.6%) and 68 (25.1). Viterbo, characterized by As contaminated drinking water, showed a positive association between iAs and tap water consumption (GMR 2.513, p=0.10). Gela and Taranto, showed a positive association between iAs and occupational exposure (Gela: GMR 2.4 µg/L, p<0.01; Taranto: GMR 2.1, p<0.01). Fish consumption is associated with higher iAs concentration in the whole sample (GMR 1.5, p<0.05), particularly in men of Gela (GMR 2.4, p<0.01). Similar results were observed using Asi+MMA+DMA . Conclusion Results are relevant to identify and take care subjects outliers for inorganic-organic arsenic and to aim primary prevention measure for decreasing the level of population exposure.