ArticleEnvironmental research2020
Associations between prenatal exposure to DDT and DDE and allergy symptoms and diagnoses in the Venda Health Examination of Mothers, Babies and their Environment (VHEMBE), South Africa.
Article in Environmental research, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 19 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effect of Indoor Residual Spraying on Malaria in Pregnancy and Pregnancy Outcomes: A Systematic Review.The American journal of tropical medicine and hygiene · 2025Pooled it
- The association between children's exposure to pesticides and asthma, wheezing, and lower respiratory tract infections. A systematic review and meta-analysis.Frontiers in public health · 2024Pooled it
- Review
- Prenatal Exposure to Emerging Pesticides and Childhood Allergy Risk: A Mixture Assessment in an Urban Birth Cohort.Environmental science & technology letters · 2025Article
- Prevalence of asthma and wheeze among preschool and school-aged children in Africa: A meta-analysis.Public health challenges · 2024Review
- Prevalence of Wheezing and Its Association with Environmental Tobacco Smoke Exposure among Rural and Urban Preschool Children in Mpumalanga Province, South Africa.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2024Article
- Maternal exposure to pyrethroid insecticides during pregnancy and respiratory allergy symptoms among children participating in the Venda Health Examination of Mothers, Babies and their Environment (VHEMBE).Environmental research · 2024Article
- The Association between Long-Term DDT or DDE Exposures and an Altered Sperm Epigenome-a Cross-Sectional Study of Greenlandic Inuit and South African VhaVenda Men.Environmental health perspectives · 2024Article
- Sex specific associations between in utero exposure to persistent organic pollutants and allergy-related outcomes in childhood: The Rhea Mother-Child Cohort (Crete, Greece).Journal of developmental origins of health and disease · 2022Article
- Respiratory and allergic health effects in children living near agriculture: A review.The Science of the total environment · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane (DDT) is an organochlorine insecticide that is banned internationally except for use as part of Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS) programs to control malaria. Although animal studies show that DDT and its breakdown product dichlorodiphenyl dichloroethylene (DDE) affect the immune system and may cause allergies, no studies have examined this question in populations where IRS is conducted. The aim of our study was to investigate whether prenatal exposure to DDT and DDE is associated with allergy symptoms and diagnose among South African children living in an area where IRS is conducted. To accomplish this aim, we used data from the Venda Health Examination of Mothers, Babies and their Environment (VHEMBE), an ongoing birth cohort study of 752 children born between 2012 and 2013 in the rural Vhembe district of Limpopo, South Africa. We measured maternal peripartum serum concentrations of DDT and DDE, and administered a questionnaire to the caregivers of 658 children aged 3.5 years to collect information on allergy symptoms and diagnoses as well as potential confounders using validated instruments. Using multiple logistic regression models, we found positive associations between DDT and DDE serum concentrations and most of the allergy symptoms and diagnoses. Maternal DDT (Odds Ratio [OR] = 1.5 per 10-fold increase, 95% Confidence interval, CI = 1.0, 2.3) and DDE (OR = 1.4, 95% CI = 0.8, 2.4) serum concentrations were most strongly associated with caregiver report of wheezing or whistling in the chest. Concentrations of DDT and/or DDE were also associated with increased odds of children's chests sounding wheezy during or after exercise, itchy rashes coming and going for at least six months, diagnosis of food allergy, and diagnosis of dust or dust mites allergy but confidence intervals crossed the null. Results suggest that prenatal exposure to DDT, and possibly DDE, is associated with elevated odds of wheezing among children from an IRS area.
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