Association between prenatal exposure to multiple insecticides and child body weight and body composition in the VHEMBE South African birth cohort

Our single-pollutant and multi-pollutant model results show that maternal serum p,p′-DDT concentration was consistently and positively associated with body composition and body weight in young girls and that maternal urinary pyrethroid metabolite concentrations (particularly cis-DBCA and trans-DCCA) were negatively associated with body weight and body composition in young boys. Joint effects of the insecticide exposure mixture were also apparent, underscoring the importance of using advanced statistical methods to examine the health effects of chemical mixtures.