Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals and Gender Issues

October’s issue of Environmental Health Perspectives has a good summary, from varying perspectives, about environmental exposures to endocrine disrupting chemicals, their potential for increasing the frequency of abnormalities in human sexuality (gender development, reproductive capacity and sex ratios), and the implications potentially associated with various outcomes. There have been isolated occurrences of abnormalities, principally in wildlife in high-dose exposure settings, and there is an active debate about whether or not there are risks to human populations from widespread low-dose exposures. Some argue that we need to look harder at other causes for the incidence of sexual abnormalities (advanced parenting age, smoking, diet), but if the ”Our Stolen Future” side of the debate turns out to the correct outcome, the results may be significant public health and social problems in the future, as well as economic disruptions. The economic disruptions would come about from the replacement of numerous widely used products, including plastics, plasticizers, pesticides and pharmaceuticals currently in the commerce stream.

The same issue also has the paper discussing the declining sex ratio in an Aamjiwnaang First Nation community near Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. The sex ratio (proportion of male births) of the Aamjiwnaang First Nation was observed over the period 1984-2003. The trend in the proportion of male live births has been declining continuously from the early 1990s to 2003, from an apparently stable sex ratio prior to that time. While a number of factors may be responsible, the community is located in proximity to a large aggregation of chemical industries, warranting further investigation of potential chemical exposures.