Collaborative ECHO research led by Giehae Choi, PhD and Jessie Buckley, PhD, both of Johns Hopkins University, along with Tracey Woodruff, PhD, MPH of the University of California, San Francisco, investigates whether pregnant people are exposed to potentially dangerous chemicals commonly found in a variety of household products, including plastics, disinfectants, and products that contain dyes or pigments. Two of these chemicals, melamine and cyanuric acid, were found in over 99% of study participants, and exposure to four different types of aromatic amines were also found in nearly all participants. Levels of these chemicals were higher among participants of color and those exposed to tobacco smoke. This research, titled “Exposure to melamine and its derivatives and aromatic amines among pregnant women in the United States: The ECHO Program,” is published in Chemosphere.
This research focused on melamine, along with related chemicals like cyanuric acid and aromatic amines. Even though these chemicals are found in a wide variety of household products, their exposures are not regularly monitored in human populations. In general, people can be exposed to harmful chemicals through the air, contaminated food, household dust, water, plastics, products that contain dyes and pigments, tobacco smoke, diesel fumes, and more. Melamine is known to cause health problems in children, but there is limited research on its effects in pregnant people, and in adults in general.
To address this gap, this study used new methods to measure the levels of 45 chemicals in urine samples from 171 pregnant people across nine ECHO cohorts. Of these participants, 40% were Hispanic, 34% were White, 20% were Black, 4% were Asians, and the remaining 2% were from other or multiple racial groups. The researchers also examined data on the participants’ race and ethnicity, age, education, and marital status to determine whether chemical exposure was higher in different sociodemographic groups. Levels of most chemicals were higher among Black and Hispanic women. For example, levels of 3,4-dichloroaniline—a chemical used in the production of dyes and pesticides—were more than 100% higher among Black and Hispanic women compared to White women.
“This is the first national study to reveal that pregnant people in the U.S. are widely exposed to melamine, cyanuric acid, and aromatic amines—chemicals that may be harmful to maternal health and child development,” said Dr. Choi. “This raises concerns for the health of pregnant people and babies.”
Future research will expand this study to include over 1,700 pregnant people and investigate whether higher exposure to these chemicals during pregnancy might be related to negative child health outcomes.
A recent review paper authored by Michael O’Shea, MD of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Monica McGrath, PhD of Johns Hopkins University, and Judy Aschner, MD of Hackensack University, and Barry Lester, PhD of Brown University’s Alpert Medical School provides an overview of the collaborative work ECHO has been doing to study and collect data on the effects of premature birth on child health outcomes. The article describes ECHO cohorts that have enrolled premature infants (born before 32 weeks of gestation) between April 2002 and March 2020, including three ECHO cohorts that are almost exclusively comprised of preterm infants. Researchers can use ECHO data to investigate the relationship between preterm birth, environmental exposures, and childhood chronic and developmental health conditions. This research, titled “Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes: Cohorts of Individuals Born Very Preterm,” is published in 
Collaborative ECHO research led by Amy Padula, PhD, MSc from the University of California, San Francisco and Rachel Morello-Frosch, PhD, MPH from the University of California, Berkeley found that many ECHO participants are motivated to engage in individual and collective action to protect their families and communities from the negative effects of chemical exposures. These findings may be used to improve report-back of chemical results and shift responsibility of chemical exposures from individuals to policymakers.
In a collaborative research effort involving participants from nine ECHO cohorts, Jessie P. Buckley, PhD, of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and Tracey J. Woodruff, PhD, of the University of California San Francisco led a research team that examined chemical exposures in pregnant women. This is the largest exposure study to measure more than 100 contemporary and emerging chemicals simultaneously in a diverse population of pregnant women in the U.S. The researchers used a new method for measuring multiple chemicals in a small amount of urine.