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Jordi Sunyer,^1,2 Maties Torrent,³ Laura Muñoz-Ortiz,¹ Núria Ribas-Fitó,¹ Daniel Carrizo,⁴ Joan Grimalt,⁴ Josep M. Antó,^1,2 and Paul Cullinan⁵

¹Unitat Recerca Respiratòria i Ambiental, Institut Municipal d’Investigació Mèdica, Barcelona, Spain; ²Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain; ³Area de Salud de Menorca, IB-SALUT, Menorca, Spain; ⁴Environmental Chemistry, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Barcelona, Spain; ⁵Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Imperial College, London, United Kingdom

Abstract
Prevalence of asthma increases with increasing dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene (DDE) levels. However, the effect of early-life exposure, the fundamental window of exposure, is unknown. We assessed the association between prenatal DDE and other organochlorine compounds, and atopy and asthma during infancy. All women presenting for antenatal care in Menorca (Spain) over 12 months starting in mid-1997 were invited to take part in a longitudinal study ; 482 children were subsequently enrolled, and 468 (97.1%) provided complete outcome data up to the fourth year of study. Prenatal exposure of organochlorine compounds was measured in cord serum in 405 (83%) children. Asthma was defined on the basis of wheezing at 4 years of age, persistent wheezing, or doctor-diagnosed asthma. We measured specific immunoglobulin-E (IgE) against house dust mite, cat, and grass in sera extracted at 4 years of age. DDE (median = 1.03 ng/mL) was detected in all children, as well as hexachlorobenzene (0.68 ng/mL) and polychlorobiphenyls (0.69 ng/mL) . Wheezing at 4 years of age increased with DDE concentration, particularly at the highest quartile [9% in the lowest quartile (< 0.57 ng/mL) vs. 19% in the highest quartile (1.90 ng/mL) ; relative risk = 2.63 (95% confidence interval 1.19-4.69) , adjusting for maternal asthma, breast-feeding, education, social class, or other organochlorines]. The association was not modified by IgE sensitization and occurred with the same strength among nonatopic subjects and among those with persistent wheezing or diagnosed asthma. DDE was not associated with atopy alone. Prenatal exposure to DDE residues may contribute to development of asthma. Key words: asthma, atopy, children, DDE dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene, organochlorines. Environ Health Perspect 113:1787-1790 (2005) . doi:10.1289/ehp.8127 available via http://dx.doi.org/ [Online 18 July 2005]

Address correspondence to J. Sunyer, IMIM-Environmental Respiratory Research Unit, Institut Municipal d’Investigació Mèdica, C. Doctor Aiguader 80, 08003 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Telephone: 34-93-221-1009. Fax: 34-93-221-6448. E-mail: jsunyer@imim.es

This study was funded in part by Instituto de Salud Carlos III Red de Grupos Infancia y Medio Ambiente (G03/176) . This study has also been supported in part by the Fundació “La Caixa” (00/077-00) and Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Red de Centros de Investigación en Epidemiología y Salud Pública (C03/09) .

The authors declare they have no competing financial interests.

Received 18 March 2005 ; accepted 18 July 2005.

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