EPA IRIS — Methylmercury Oral Reference Dose

Overview

The EPA Integrated Risk Information System chemical assessment for methylmercury (CASRN 22967-92-6) provides the operative US federal oral reference dose for methylmercury exposure, anchored on developmental neurotoxicity observed in the Faroe Islands and Seychelles cohort studies (EPA IRIS MeHg). The RfD was last revised July 27, 2001 and remains in force; methylmercury is currently in step 1 of EPA’s IRIS reassessment process (EPA IRIS MeHg).

The EPA RfD of 0.1 µg/kg/day (EPA IRIS MeHg) is approximately equivalent to the JECFA PTWI of 1.6 µg/kg/week (daily-equivalent ~0.23 µg/kg/day) (JECFA 61st) and the EFSA TWI of 1.3 µg/kg/week (daily-equivalent ~0.19 µg/kg/day) (EFSA Hg 2012) — all three are anchored on the same developmental neurotoxicity endpoint and the same cohort literature, and arrive at similar daily-equivalent values despite different averaging windows.

Sources

• EPA IRIS MeHg — EPA IRIS Chemical Assessment Summary, Methylmercury.

References

Works cited in this page’s text, in first-appearance order. This is not the full corpus for this page; it is only what the prose above draws on. The complete set of sources is listed under Sources below. Each title links to its source record, which carries the ingest receipt, the extracted values, and the file hash of the document it was built from.

1. Methylmercury (MeHg) — IRIS Chemical Assessment SummaryU.S. Environmental Protection Agency · 2001 · iris.epa.govGovernment
2. Evaluation of Certain Food Additives and Contaminants (Methylmercury), 61st Meeting of JECFAJoint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives · WHO Technical Report Series 922 · 2004 · doi.org/10.1016/s0168-1605(03)00167-3Government
3. Scientific Opinion on the Risk for Public Health Related to the Presence of Mercury and Methylmercury in FoodEFSA Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain (CONTAM) · EFSA Journal 2012;10(12):2985 · 2012 · doi.org/10.2903/j.efsa.2012.2985Government

Update history

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