The chemical disruption of human metabolism

Abstract

Background: Recent evidence highlights the reality of unprecedented human exposure to toxic chemical agents found throughout our environment – in our food and water supply, in the air we breathe, in the products we apply to our skin, in the medical and dental materials placed into our bodies, and even within the confines of the womb. With biomonitoring confirming the widespread bioaccumulation of myriad toxicants among population groups, expanding research continues to explore the pathobiological impact of these agents on human metabolism.

Methods: This review was prepared by assessing available medical and scientific literature from Medline as well as by reviewing several books, toxicology journals, government publications, and conference proceedings. The format of a traditional integrated review was chosen.

Results: Toxicant exposure and accrual has been linked to numerous biochemical and pathophysiological mechanisms of harm. Some toxicants effect metabolic disruption via multiple mechanisms.

Conclusions: As a primary causative determinant of chronic disease, toxicant exposures induce metabolic disruption in myriad ways, which consequently result in varied clinical manifestations, which are then categorized by health providers into innumerable diagnoses. Chemical disruption of human metabolism has become an etiological determinant of much illness throughout the lifecycle, from neurodevelopmental abnormalities in-utero to dementia in the elderly.

Keywords:

• Biochemistry
• chemical agents
• toxicants
• epigenetics
• endocrine disruption
• sensitivity-related illness
• detoxification pathways
• metabolic pathways
• metabolism
• multimorbidity
• mitochondria
• oxidative stress
• immune dysfunction

Disclosure statement

There are no conflicts of interest. No funding has been received for any part of this work.