The 145th Annual Meeting of the Pharmaceutical Society of Japan (Fukuoka)

Organizer: Yukiko Fujii (Daiichi University of Pharmacy), Kouji Harada (Kyoto Univ.)

Per-/poly-fluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS) are organic fluorine compounds that have a stable carbon chain in which hydrogen atoms have been replaced by fluorine atoms. PFOS (sulphonic acid with 8 carbons) and PFOA (carboxylic acid with 8 carbons), which are typical PFAS, were designated as Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) under the Stockholm Convention in 2009 and 2019 respectively. Subsequently, PFHxS (sulfonic acid with 6 carbons) with a short carbon chain length was designated as a POPs in 2022, and as of 2024, the addition of long-chain PFCAs (carboxylic acids with 9 or more carbons) to the treaty is being considered. On the other hands, PFAS that have been used in the past are still present in the environment, and in recent years, several regulations and recommendations have been announced in various countries regarding the concentration of PFAS in tap water and human blood. Although epidemiological studies have suggested various toxicity and health effects of PFAS, the findings obtained from basic science research are still not sufficient. Therefore, research to support the health risk assessment of PFAS from the field of pharmacology is strongly required. In this symposium, we will report on the latest situation regarding PFAS in 2024, and five speakers will report on the following topics: 'toxicity assessment', 'Effects of exposure during fetal development', 'Effects of exposure to low concentrations', 'toxicokinetics', 'species differences', and 'human body burden'.