Abstract
Humans and animals can be exposed to Dioxins and Furans through ingestion of fatty food, skin contact, and breathing contaminated air. Resulting health problems include skin disease, immune problems, and cancers. Managing the release of these chemicals is therefore important. The Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants requires parties to adopt measures that reduce sources of these chemicals. Sierra Leone developed its National Implementation Plan (NIP) in 2008, in compliance with this requirement. However, no known further steps have been taken, particularly at community level. In 2013, the UNDP’s GEF/SGP funded a pilot project to manage the release of Dioxins and Furans from two dumpsites in Freetown, Sierra Leone. This work was sponsored with funds from that project. The work sought to delineate the exposure of communities within and around the Bormeh-Kingtom dumpsite (Kingtom, Kolleh town, Ascension town, Crab town, and Congo town) to the chemicals. The study considered sources of exposure, relative quantities generated per year, and the routes of exposure. This exposure study is a first step in managing the release from those sources. Enumerators deployed at the dumpsite every day, 7:00 AM to 6:00 PM, for three months, quantifying and recording source materials. The amount of source materials dumped per day informed calculation of Dioxin/Furan releases in grams toxicity equivalence per year. The results revealed a release of 128.914 g TEQ/year in air and residue. This implies that the communities are at high risk of inhalation and dermal exposure. Livestock, mainly pigs, are also exposed as they feed on the waste deposited in the dumpsite. Humans in turn feed on the livestock, a recipe for biomagnification. The project team has been working on developing Best Management Practices to suppress the release of the chemicals.
Highlights
People can be exposed to Polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins (PCDD), commonly known as Dioxins, and polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDF), commonly known as Furans, by eating high-fat foods such as milk products, eggs, meat, and some types of fish
Source Quantification Sources of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) at this dumpsite are mainly plastic materials, and plants [8]. These materials were placed in bags and weighed on scales (Figure 5) to determine the weight of trips brought in by waste transporters. These weights were used in computing the flow rate of waste materials and the release of POPs at the dumpsite (Table 1)
This work sought to delineate the exposure of people to dioxins and furans released from the Bormeh-Kingtom dumpsite
Summary
People can be exposed to Polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins (PCDD), commonly known as Dioxins, and polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDF), commonly known as Furans, by eating high-fat foods such as milk products, eggs, meat, and some types of fish. Burning of waste and the manufacture of chemical products containing these substances are potential sources of exposure as well [1]. In Sierra Leone, the largest source of dioxins and furans is the large-scale burning of municipal and medical waste [2]. Most of the waste burning takes place openly at dumpsites located in congested settlements within cities. The settlements have domestic animals that feed from these dumpsites. The community in turn depends on the animals as source of protein. Since dioxins and furans bioaccumulate in the food chain [3], this food consumption pattern is a public health concern in the population
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