Aflatoxins: data on human carcinogenic risk.

Some of the major difficulties in assessing the role of aflatoxin (AF) in the causation of liver cancer are discussed. Firstly, exposure to AF in Africa and parts of Asia and Latin America might begin very early in life and episodically thereafter. The number of episodes and the degree of exposure to AF varies greatly by country and region, by agricultural and crop storage practices, by season and by other factors difficult to control in any questionnaire-based study.

Aflatoxin exposure, hepatitis B virus infection and liver cancer in Swaziland.

A study was carried out in Swaziland to assess the relationship between aflatoxin exposure, hepatitis B infection, and the incidence of liver-cell carcinoma, which is the most commonly occurring malignancy among males in Swaziland. Levels of aflatoxin intake were evaluated in dietary samples from households across the country, and crop samples taken from representative farms. Prevalence of hepatitis B markers was estimated from the serum of blood donors, and liver cancer incidence was recorded for the years 1979-83 through a national system of cancer registration.

Dietary aflatoxins and human primary liver cancer.

The results of the dietary aflatoxin-liver cancer study carried out in the Murang'a district of Kenya have been reassessed in relation to disease incidence rates based on a total of seven years of cancer registration and related to the Population Census carried out during the course of the initial study. These newly derived data have been combined with the results of a second similar dietary aflatoxin-liver cancer study which was later carried out in Swaziland. Separate treatment of the male and female data has been considered necessary due to the variation of the sex ratio of the disease incidence in the two areas.