Phthalate endocrine-disrupters: Common household chemicals found in dust may trigger obesity

Are your kids stacking on the kilos, but you’re not sure why? Researchers in the US have found a link to something found in every single household.

Researchers have been sifting through the dust that accumulates in everyone’s homes. And they’ve been discovering some weighty issues.

Duke University researchers have published a study with the Endocrine Society in which they found common household chemicals — such as detergents, cleaners, paints, cosmetics and plastics — attached to many of the minuscule flecks of dust floating around household rooms.

These chemicals, however, are often endocrine-disrupters.

This means they are compounds that mimic human hormones.

And such hormones can trigger our bodies’ natural mechanisms to start packing away fat.

But their most worrisome finding is whom this is affecting the most: the children crawling around floors and sticking their grotty fingers in their mouths.

Children playing in the home can ingest up to 100 milligrams of contaminated dust every day.

This is some of the first research investigating links between exposure to chemical mixtures present in the indoor environment and metabolic health of children living in those homes, says researcher Dr Christopher Kassotis of the Nicholas School of the Environment.

We found that two thirds of dust extracts were able to promote fat cell development and half promote precursor fat cell proliferation at 100 micrograms, or approximately 1000 times lower levels than what children consume on a daily basis.

Young children are believed to consume somewhere between 60 and 100 milligrams of dust every day.

It’s previously been shown some endocrine-disrupting household products — which contain the chemical category called phthalates — could cause fat cells to gather triglycerides (fats) circulating in the blood. These are then stored until other hormones trigger their release back into the blood stream as an energy source.

This study adds further weight to the understanding of the issue.

Some 200 North Carolina homes were sampled for dust. More than 100 chemicals were identified in them later in the lab. About 70 of these had a significant influence no the development of fat cells.

This suggests that mixtures of chemicals occurring in the indoor environment might be driving these effects, Kassotis said.

The study warns that even relatively low concentrations of these phthalate chemicals in dust can trigger the production of precursor fat cells.

The researchers are continuing their study to pinpoint the exact household products producing this contamination.

Phthalates have been linked to a wide range of issues, ranging from fertility problems, and liver disease through to some cancers.