Anses Agence nationale de sécurité sanitaire Alimentation Environnement Travail

What is the Agency doing as regards PCBs?

For several years now, PCB pollution of French rivers and lakes and its impact on the population has been a topical issue. Since 2003, the Agency and its experts have been working on this difficult topic and have issued over twenty Opinions in order to assess the precise health risks associated with consuming PCB-contaminated fish, to provide the State with scientific and technical support in managing the risk associated with these contaminants and to help define European regulations on NDL-PCBs.

Assessment of population exposure and risk

The Agency provides data on French exposure to PCBs.
In the general population, the main sources of PCBs are fish and seafood. In 2003, AFSSA and INRA (French National Institute for Agricultural Research) set up the CALIPSO study on intakes of PCBs and other contaminants in consumers of large amounts of fish and seafood. Moreover, AFSSA was the first entity in France to conduct a detailed review of dietary PCB intakes, for both DL-PCBs (in 2005) and NDL-PCBs (in 2007).

These studies provided the necessary French exposure data for the establishment of the European regulation on DL-PCBs, which entered in force in 2006.

The Agency is currently helping to set European standards for NDL-PCBs. It has already issued recommended upper limits for NDL-PCBs which correspond to the regulatory DL-PCB limit, as a tool for assessing the risk of PCB contamination in freshwater and sea fish (Opinion of 27 November 2009).

Support for risk management of PCBs in freshwater fish

The Agency is also providing scientific and technical support to the State for managing the PCB-related risk. In this context, in February 2008 and in May 2009 it recommended a method for implementing river fish sampling plans at national level. Then, based on the data from these plans, it offered scientific and technical support for the interpretation of the health impact of these data (Opinion of 13 May 2009).

The first stage of the plan aims to identify the zones where fishing must be prohibited (zones where all fish species are contaminated and the regulatory maximum limits are exceeded) or, on the contrary, the zones where fishing can be authorised because there is no health risk (zones where no fish species exceeds the regulatory limits).

The second stage is implemented in intermediate zones where only some of the fish species are contaminated. In these zones, temporary consumption restrictions may be set up to enable additional analyses to be made and the identification of fish species that are fit for consumption.
These sampling plans are conducted in close partnership with the Office National de l'Eau et des Milieux Aquatiques (ONEMA) which handles the collection, preparation and analysis of the fish samples.

Finally, as part of the national action plan on PCBs set up by the Ministries of ecology, agriculture and health in early 2008, AFSSA was entrusted with conducting a study on PCB exposure and levels in adult consumers of river fish, mainly in anglers and their spouses. This study, conducted in partnership with the InVS (French Institute for Public Health Surveillance), aims to study PCB impregnation (i.e. blood PCB levels) in consumers of river fish in sectors where pollution has been identified and to compare these with unexposed control populations. The study will provide a detailed analysis (in the next two years) of the determinants of these blood concentration levels, since river fish are not the only foods to contribute to PCB exposure.

What are ANSES's recommendations as regards PCBs?

As for other high-fat foods, fish is one of the foodstuffs that contributes the most to the population's exposure to PCBs. Given the nutritional benefits of eating fish (1), the Agency, like other health agencies, recommends eating a wide variety of fish species from different fishing areas at least twice a week and avoiding, as a precaution, exclusive consumption of oily fish, particularly in women of childbearing age and children under age three.

The Agency also recommends extending the European regulation, which currently only concerns dioxin-like PCBs, to all PCBs.

(1) Fish is a good source of the essential fatty acids necessary for the development of the nervous system and formation of cognitive functions, as well as of proteins, vitamins and trace elements (such as selenium) and fatty acids with anti-thrombosis and anti-arrythmia properties, and especially polyunsaturated omega 3 fats.

On 1 July 2010, AFSSA and AFSSET merged to create ANSES, French Agency for Food, Environment and Occupational Health Safety.

April 2010