Health risk assessment to polychlorinated naphthalenes dioxin-like compounds in French sea food consumers.

There has been a recent revival of interest in some historical contaminants such as polychlorinated naphthalenes (PCNs). However, occurrence data are still lacking in some countries although industrial production of PCNs has been reported. This observation led to the first ever assessment of their presence in fish and seafood products in France in the present work. Their analysis was integrated in an already validated method applied for polychlorinated dibenzodioxins/furans (PCDD/Fs) and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), based on the structural similarity existing between these POPs. Performances of the method (LODs in the range 0.10-0.28 pg g-1 wet weight (ww), LOQs in the range 0.33-0.93 pg g-1 ww), enabled monitoring 69 di-to octachlorinated congeners in a large representative set of fish and seafood samples collected in 2005 in four coastal areas of the French mainland (n > 30). Their systematic presence was demonstrated in all the investigated seafood products, with levels (ΣPCNs in the range 2-440 pg g-1 wet weight) close to those already reported in other European fish and seafood sampled at a similar period. In addition, the robust measurement of almost all possible PCNs (69/75) allowed a fine interpretation of the observed profiles, highlighting in particular the specificities between species and fishing areas. Compared to the PCDD/Fs, PCBs, and polybrominated diphenylethers levels also measured for this set of samples, PCNs were observed as minor contributors to total concentrations (0.05-3.2%). The specific PCN related dietary dioxin-like exposure could be evaluated at 0.028-0.051 pg of toxic equivalent (TEQ) per kg of body weight per week for an adult, based on fish and seafood consumption only. Overall, this study provides the first baseline data on the occurrence of a large number of PCNs in France, which will allow future evaluation of temporal trends and associated risks.