EHP: Nutrition Can Modulate the Toxicity of Environmental Pollutants

[Guest guest]

Commentary:

Nutrition Can Modulate the Toxicity of Environmental Pollutants:

Implications in Risk Assessment and Human Health.

Environ Health Perspect. 2012 Feb 22. [Epub ahead of print]

http://ehp03.niehs.nih.gov/article/info:doi/10.1289/ehp.1104712

Hennig B, Ormsbee L, McClain CJ, Watkins BA, Blumberg B, Bachas LG,

on W, C, Suk WA.

University of Kentucky.

Abstract

Background: The paradigm of human risk assessment includes many

variables that must be viewed collectively in order to improve human

health and prevent chronic disease. The pathology of chronic diseases is

complex, though, and may be influenced by exposure to environmental

pollutants, a sedentary lifestyle and poor dietary habits. Much emerging

evidence suggests that nutrition can modulate the toxicity of

environmental pollutants, which may alter human risks associated with

toxicant exposures. Objectives: This commentary discusses the basis for

recommending that nutrition be considered as a critical variable in

disease outcomes associated with exposure to environmental pollutants,

thus establishing the importance of incorporating nutrition within the

context of cumulative risk assessment. Discussion: There is a convincing

body of research indicating that nutrition is a modulator of

vulnerability to environmental insults; thus, it is timely to consider

nutrition as a vital component of human risk assessment. Nutrition may

serve as either an agonist or antagonist (e.g. high fat foods or foods

rich in antioxidants, respectively) of the health impacts associated

with exposure to environmental pollutants. Dietary practices and food

choices may help explain the large variability observed in human risk

assessment. Conclusion: We recommend that nutrition and dietary

practices be incorporated into future environmental research and the

development of risk assessment paradigms. Healthful nutrition

interventions might be a powerful approach to reduce disease risks

associated with many environmental toxic insults, and should be

considered a variable within the context of cumulative risk assessment,

and where appropriate, a potential tool for subsequent risk reduction.