- Inventory and collection or generation of data required for environmental burden of disease of chemicals (specific or aggregated exposure routes, windows of exposure, vulnerable populations, occupational settings, geographical locations, age groups etc.) for a selected set of chemicals and populations
- Risk assessment, environmental burden of disease calculations, health impact assessment, and (social) cost benefit analyses, inform stakeholders and policymakers to help protect and eventually improve human health
- Objectify the impact of current chemical exposure on health in EU populations, prioritise preventive or mitigatory actions to be taken, and estimate the environmental burden of disease and costs avoided as a result of EU policies and regulations
Key messages
- The project houses different case studies on environmental burden of disease (EBD) of chemicals.
- FAIRification of data applied in the case studies is a must.
- Identification of datagaps on exposure, exposure-response and health outcomes is included in the lessons learnt from the case studies.
Overview
To protect people’s health, we need to understand how chemicals in the environment affect us. This project is improving access to essential data needed to measure the health impacts of harmful chemicals identified as priorities within PARC.
Right now, key information is often missing – such as how much people are exposed to chemicals (internally or externally), how this exposure varies by location, job, income, or age, and what health effects might follow. This lack of data makes it difficult to estimate how much disease or harm is caused by chemicals (EBD) and to carry out health impact assessments (HIA) ↗.
This project is:
- identifying data gaps and increasing the availability of high-quality information on exposure and health outcomes;
- focusing on specific groups like vulnerable populations and workers, and different exposure scenarios;
- supporting regulators in assessing risks, setting priorities, providing indicators and developing fairer chemical policies.
It contributes directly to the EU’s Zero Pollution Action Plan ↗, especially the goals of reducing health inequalities and tracking progress towards cleaner, safer environments. Pollution doesn’t affect everyone equally – so better data helps ensure that policies protect those most at risk.
Working alongside three other related projects (case studies, methodological progress and indicators), this effort feeds into the development of stronger methods and indicators to guide future health and environmental decisions.
Achievements & Results
The following assessments have already been completed:
- Impact of pyrethroid-insecticide exposure and ADHD in Europe based on HBM data (VITO);
- Cardiovascular diseases attributable to lead exposure in European adults (DTU);
- Burden of lead and methylmercury exposure on IQ loss in children in Europe – single-substance and mixture approach (ANSES);
- Impact of municipal solid waste incineration emissions on cancer-related mortality (FMUL);
- Burden of disease study on arsenic exposure and lung, bladder, and skin cancer (Sciensano);
- Influence of waste co-incineration in a cement plant on cancer burden (OI and NIJZ).
Ongoing assessments and activities:
- Possible impact of glyphosate-based herbicides and diabetes in EU countries (IRAS);
- Incorporating a time-to-event model to improve the prediction of age of onset or death (RIVM);
- Impact of exposure to PFAS and infectious diseases (VITO);
- Exposure to cadmium and chronic kidney disease (Sciensano);
- Exposure to a mixture of cadmium and lead and nephrotoxicity (Sciensano);
- Probability modeling in burden of disease (UBA).
Policy relevance
Through environmental burden of disease assessment a prioritisation can be initiated on the potential impact of chemicals in the EU. Health impact assessment provide evaluations of scenarios or policies. The different case studies provide a more robust estimate on the burden of disease caused by different chemical stressors. Indicators can be developed on exposure, risk and burden to inform policymakers.
Related Publications
We investigated the environmental burden of disease - measured in disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), disease incidence, and health costs - associated with pyrethroid-induced attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
A tool for assessing the validity of cell culture studies will be developed to support hazard assessment by differentiating studies based on their scientific robustness.
Human biomonitoring (HBM) data indicate that exposure to pyrethroids is widespread in Europe, with significantly higher exposure observed in children compared to adults. Epidemiological, toxicological, and mechanistic studies raise concerns for potential human health effects, particularly, behavioral effects such as attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children at low levels of exposure. Based on an exposure-response function from a single European study and on available quality-assured and harmonized HBM data collected in France, Germany, Iceland, Switzerland, and Israel, a preliminary estimate of the environmental burden of disease for ADHD associated with pyrethroid exposure was made for individuals aged 0–19 years. The estimated annual number of prevalencebased disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) per million inhabitants were 27 DALYs for Israel, 21 DALYs for France, 12 DALYs for both Switzerland and Iceland, and 3 DALYs for Germany; while the annual ADHD cases per million inhabitants attributable to pyrethroids were 2189 for Israel, 1710 for France, 969 for Iceland, 944 for Switzerland, and 209 for Germany. Direct health costs related to ADHD ranged between 0.3 and 2.5 million EUR yearly per million inhabitants for the five countries. Additionally, a substantial number of ADHD cases, on average 18%, were
associated with pyrethroid exposure. Yet, these figures should be interpreted with caution given the uncertainty of the estimation. A sensitivity analysis showed that by applying a different exposure-response function from outside the EU, the population attributable fraction decreased from an average of 18 to 7%. To ensure more robust disease burden estimates and adequate follow-up of policy measures, more HBM studies are needed, along with increased efforts to harmonize the design of epidemiological studies upfront to guarantee meta-analysis of exposureresponse functions. This is particularly important for pyrethroids as evidence of potential adverse health effects is continuously emerging.