Assessing Chronic Public Health Impacts Associated With Exposures to Insecticides Used to Control Adult Mosquitoes Carrying West Nile Virus. R. J. Blanchet, S. Schettler, M. R. Seeley, and T. S. Bowers, Gradient Corporation
With the recent episodes of mosquito-borne West Nile virus, public health agencies are considering the use of insecticides to control adult mosquitoes. As with any actions potentially impacting public health, human exposures to the active ingredients in the insecticides need to be assessed through a public health risk assessment. The objective of this public health risk assessment is to determine whether the application of insecticides to control the transmission of mosquito-borne pathogens in New York City may pose a significant risk to human health. Based on the list of insecticides approved by New York State to control adult mosquitoes, five active ingredients (malathion, naled, permethrin, sumithrin, and resmithrin) and a synergist (piperonyl butoxide) were evaluated in this human health risk assessment (HHRA). Human populations potentially exposed to these active ingredients include child and adult residents and recreators, city public workers, community gardeners, and the homeless. Likely chronic exposure pathways for these receptors include incidental ingestion due to hand-to-mouth behaviors, ingestion of contaminated produce, fish, and water, inhalation of resuspended dust and volatilized compounds, and dermal contact with insecticide residues on surfaces, water, and in soil. None of the human populations evaluated in this HHRA had noncancer hazard indices greater than one for any of the active ingredients under average and reasonable maximum exposure scenarios. Carcinogenic risks associated with potential exposures to malathion and permethrin for the same human populations were within or below USEPA’s target risk range of less than 10-6 to 10-4. For example, the highest cancer risk of 4.9x10-6 was associated with exposures to permethrin by residents (child and adult exposures combined). This poster presents a more detailed discussion of the methodology used to evaluate potential exposures to the active ingredients present in these insecticides.
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