Exposure to pesticide residues and contaminants of the vegetarian population—French data

Ségolène Fleury (1) , Nawel Bemrah (1) , Alexandre Nougadère (1) , Benjamin Allès (2, 3) , Mathilde Touvier (2, 3) , Gilles Rivière (1)

1 Risk Assessment Unit
2 CRESS (U1153 / UMR_A_1125 / UMR_S_1153) - Centre de Recherche Épidémiologie et Statistique Sorbonne Paris Cité
3 USPC - Université Sorbonne Paris Cité

In the present chapter, dietary exposures of different vegetarian populations to pesticide residues as well as those to contaminants are discussed, based on French data. For 48 pesticide residues out of 421, it was shown that, based on theoretical calculation of the exposure, vegetarians could have higher exposures than those of the general population, the pescetarian population being very close to the situation observed for the general population. On the other hand, biomonitoring studies demonstrated that there was a trend toward lower organochlorine contamination in the vegan population compared to that of the general population. With regard to contaminants, exposures to phytoestrogens or to some trace elements (Cd, Al, Ni) were higher for the vegetarian population compared to those of the general population. Otherwise, the vegetarian population studied in the present study was less exposed than the general population to other contaminants such as some persistent organic pollutants, some mycotoxins, and some trace elements.

Domaines: Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]

Ségolène Fleury, Nawel Bemrah, Alexandre Nougadère, Benjamin Allès, Mathilde Touvier, et al.. Exposure to pesticide residues and contaminants of the vegetarian population—French data. Vegetarian and Plant-Based Diets in Health and Disease Prevention, Academic Press, 922 p., 2017, 9780128039687. ⟨10.1016/B978-0-12-803968-7.00045-9⟩. ⟨hal-01606491⟩