Isn chloracne the only evidence of dioxin exposure?
Public concern about effects of dioxin on human health was heightened in 1976 following an accident at Seveso in Italy, when an explosion at a chemical factory caused the release of high levels of TCDD (dioxin). The most commonly reported effects on humans following this accident and other incidents of high dioxin exposure was a skin rash called chloracne. Since then numerous animal experiments and several epidemiological studies in humans have shown that dioxin causes a wide range of health effects. New data from Seveso found increased deaths from digestive cancer among women in Seveso who lived closest to the area that was highly contaminated with dioxin. In a 15-year follow-up study reported in the November 1997 issue of the journal Epidemiology, Pier Alberto Bertazzi, University of Milan, and co-authors found that men in the most highly contaminated site had increased mortality from rectal cancer. In February 1997 the International Agency for Research on Cancer, a part of the World
