Perfluorinated chemicals studied in breast milk, menopausal women
Two new studies of perfluorinated compounds in women raise concerns. In the first, the longer the women nursed their babies, the higher the levels of certain compounds in their babies’ blood. In the second, higher levels in women were associated with early menopause.
Researchers have for the first time quantified an association between breastfeeding and perfluorinated compounds in infants. In the study, the longer the women nursed their babies, the higher the levels of certain chemicals in their babies’ blood.
While other studies have documented the presence of PFCs – used to make non-stick cookware and stain-resistant materials – in breast milk, few have examined the rate at which these chemicals pass from mother to infant.
The scientists, led by researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said that women should not stop nursing their babies because the levels were “very low.”
“While breastfeeding can be an important excretion route for lactating mothers and exposure route for nursing infants, for most people, levels are very low and it is important to note that breast milk remains the optimal food for infants,” wrote the authors in the study published online in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.
Blood was collected from 633 women with a child younger than 3.5 years and from 49 – roughly 8 percent – of the infants. The women participated in the C8 Health Project, a study undertaken to investigate health impacts of contaminated drinking water near a DuPont factory in West Virginia.
The researchers determined that each month of breastfeeding was associated with a 3 percent decrease in mothers’ blood levels of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) and a 2 percent decrease in perfluorononanoic acid (PFNA). Study women breastfed for an average of 3.5 months.
Infant PFOA levels were 6 percent higher while PFOS levels were 4 percent higher for each month of breastfeeding.
The researchers could not rule out that the decline in the women’s levels was due to them avoiding food and drink sources with higher levels of contaminants. Levels of PFCs of women in the cohort have been dropping since 2005-2006, when the study was conducted.
PFCs can disrupt hormones but the potential health effects on infants are unknown. Previous studies from the C8 Health Project found no probable link between fetal and early postnatal PFOA exposure and birth defects or neurodevelopmental disorders in children.
