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Metal Detectors for Human Health (October 26, 2005)

New research network to bring science to bear on health, environmental regulation of metals

Article written by Andrew Vowles,
originally published Oct. 26/05 in the University of Guelph's publication "At Guelph."

A new Guelph-based research network intended to protect human health and to ensure the economic health of a key Canadian industry sector was launched at U of G in October.

The newly christened Metals in the Human Environment Research Network (MITHE-SN) will enable scientists from across Canada to help regulators set human health standards based on actual exposure to metals in water, soil, air and food. That will ensure consumer safety while potentially saving millions of dollars in regulatory costs for the country’s mining and metals industry, a key employer in Canada, says Prof. Bev Hale, Land Resource Science.

Representatives from university, industry and government gathered on campus to launch the new network. MITHE-SN will receive a total of $5.4 million through the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council (including industry funding and in-kind support) for the next five years.

Three teams of university and government scientists from across Canada will conduct research and risk assessment on metals in aquatic ecosystems, soils and plants, and foods and ingested particles. Hale is science director of the new network and will serve as principal investigator of the team studying foods and ingested particles. An expert in heavy-metal uptake in plants and soils, she has recently studied gastrointestinal availability of metals in foods.

She says U of G was chosen as the network hub because of its work and expertise straddling human health and the environment.

“It’s a natural fit,” says Hale, pointing to the University’s research strengths in food, environmental sciences and toxicology, and its connections to the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. Referring to MITHE-SN’s range of research interests, she says: “It’s almost like a mini-Guelph. It’s an echo of what Guelph has.”

The network’s researchers will study the behaviour and movement of metals in the human and natural environment, focusing especially on arsenic, cadmium, lead and nickel. A key aspect of their work will be to tease out what happens to different forms, or species, of each element.

That’s an important consideration for a key industry sector that often faces costly and time-consuming regulatory hurdles that may be based on inappropriate risk assessment and too-conservative regulation, says Prof. Len Ritter, Environmental Biology, who will serve as MITHE-SN’s administrator. “It’s taking a lot of resources to address regulatory requirements that may be trying to resolve problems that, in a practical sense, may not even exist.”

Health and environmental regulations for metals are typically based on concepts developed to govern hazardous organic pollutants such as DDT. But Ritter says those regulations fail to account for the fact that metals — unlike organic materials — occur naturally and that different forms and concentrations of the same metal found in air, water, soil or foods may have widely varying health impacts.

Take chromium, the villain of the 2000 movie Erin Brockovich, which starred Julia Roberts investigating a coverup involving contaminated water and a string of mysterious illnesses. In the film, a company was dumping the most toxic form of the metal.

“Many regulators continue to regulate as if all metals are present in their most toxic form,” says Ritter. Arsenic, for instance, may range from an outright poison and carcinogen to other forms with less impact on human health or the environment.

The network will provide information to help regulators better shape rules and policies by distinguishing among various forms of these elements and their varied health risks. Referring to companies in Canada’s billion-dollar mining and metals sector, Ritter says: “This research program should contribute important new knowledge that will help Canada’s regulatory communities separate problems that may be caused by industry from those that are there naturally.”

He points out that costs of complying with regulations may deter municipalities and businesses from cleaning up and developing former industrial properties, an important issue in his hometown of Hamilton. Rules based on incomplete science may make it uneconomical to redevelop such “brownfield” sites.

“What if they were wrong?” he says, explaining that the network’s studies will allow regulators and companies “not to tolerate greater risks but to evaluate risks correctly.”

The new network has the support of government and industry, including federal and provincial ministries, the Mining Association of Canada, the Ecotoxicology Technical Advisory Panel (an international scientific consortium representing copper, lead zinc and nickel producers) and a national environmental consulting company.

As executive director of the Canadian Network of Toxicology Centres, Ritter also co-ordinated a former NSERC-funded consortium called the Metals in the Environment Research Network (MITE-RN), which was led by Peter Campbell at the Université du Québec B Montréal. Between 1999 and 2004, that group of Canadian scientists, including Hale, studied the ecological aspects of environmental metals.

A model developed by the MITE-RN network was used by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to protect fish species by regulating metals in surface water.

“One of our most important achievements is that we’ve created the mechanisms to translate the new knowledge generated by our scientists to people who can use it to develop evidence-based public policy,” Ritter says.