Agri. & Environ.
Rubber chemical may cause cancer in humans
By Sue Mueller
Jan 19, 2009 - 10:05:18 PM

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Jan 19, 2009 (foodconsumer.org) -- British researchers published a study report in the journal Occupational and Environmental Medicine saying that a rubber chemical may increase risk of cancer in people exposed to the fumes during the manufacturing of rubber products.

Workers who were exposed to 2-mercaptobenzothiazole or MBT were found twice as likely to develop colon cancer and four times as likely to be diagnosed with bone marrow cancer as the general population, the study showed.

The longer the exposure was, the higher the risk in the workers who were occupationally exposed to the chemical.   Early studies have shown that MBT causes cancer in mice. The current study is believed to the first to establish a link between the exposure to MBT and increased risk of cancer.

The study led by Tom Sorahan of the University of Birmingham and colleagues involved 363 workers exposed to MBT who had worked at a plant for at least six months between 1955 and 1984 and diagnosed with cancer during the period from 1971 to 2005.

In the U.S., the National Toxicology Program does not seem to have recognized the chemical as a human carcinogen.   But the chemical was found once in a drug leading to regulatory responses by the FDA.