The association between DDT exposure and risk of breast cancer caused great concerns from 1990s, but the exact relevance is still in controversy. An extensive survey of DDT residue in agricultural soils, covering the entire Mainland China, was carried out from May to June in 2011. The analysis provided results on the scale of provinces, showing that the median of the total DDTs concentration was 11.67 ng/g, and the population-weighted exposure concentration was 28.40 ng/g (median). Considering the diverse DDT contributions due to regionalized diet products and diet habits, the ingestion exposure was evaluated, with daily dietary intake, estimated at 0.34 ng/g p,p'-DDE (the main bioactive constituent in DDT). The breast cancer risk of Chinese females exposed to DDT was further estimated. The population attributable fraction (PAF) with a median value of 0.6% suggests that the excess annual breast cancer incidence rate caused by p,p'-DDE exposure may reach 0.06�10-5. This risk was found to be even higher in main agricultural region such as Haihe Plain, Northeast China Plain, and Yangtze Plain after integrated factors such as population density, diet habits and DDT residual levels. The positive correlation between DDT and breast cancer incidence gave a result that it could be a risk factor of breast cancer. However, other factors such as dietary habits, genetic susceptibility and intake rate, should be considered as even more important factors than DDT exposure.

Assessing the underlying breast cancer risk of Chinese females contributed by dietary intake of residual DDT from agricultural soils

248th National Meeting (2014)

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