TITLE:
Monitoring of Environmental Mercury Exposure Using Hair as Bioindicator and the Study of Potential Factors Affecting on It in Karachi
AUTHORS:
Nida Ali, Shaikh Mohiuddin, Talat Mahmood, Majid Mumtaz
KEYWORDS:
Mercury; Hair; Bioindicator; Cold Vapor Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy (CVAA); Analysis of Variance (ANOVA); Karachi
JOURNAL NAME:
American Journal of Analytical Chemistry,
Vol.5 No.2,
January
27,
2014
ABSTRACT: The World Health Organization (WHO), Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA), and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have
recommended the use of hair for worldwide environmental monitoring. Mercury
exposure to the inhabitants of Karachi was assessed by using hair as
bioindicator. Hair samples of 200 residents of Karachi were collected and
analyzed through cold vapor atomic absorption spectroscopy (CVAA) technique for
mercury concentration. The effects of age, gender, working status, location,
food and smoking habit were investigated. Control region showed a positive
correlation between HHg and age of donor while no such correlation was observed for
polluted regions. Mercury exposure through cosmetic usage in female was only
pronounced in control
region. These results indicate that environmental pollution dominates other
potential factors. Age and smoking habit were not found to be the influencing
factors while an elevated mean level of mercury was noticed for regular fish
consumers than rarely fish consumers. 95.33% of the samples contained HHg
greater than the permissible level of 2 μg?g?1 set by WHO. An apparently healthy male donor had HHg
concentration (28.24 μg?g?1)
closer to the high risk concentration of 30 μg?g?1 based on WHO criteria. Whereas, two
female donors of the age group
of 41-50 years had HHg
concentrations (10.82 and 11.84 μg?g?1) higher than the NOAEL (no observed
adverse affects level) value (10 μg?g?1) for females which is associated
with fetus neurotoxicity. However, no symptoms of mercury toxicity were visible.
The results indicate the alarming condition of pollution in the city which
should be taken into further consideration.