Newsagents’ daily personal exposures to benzo(a)pyrene in Genoa, Italy

Daily personal exposures to benzo(a)pyrene (BaP) of 31 newsagents working in Genoa, Italy, were evaluated throughout 1998 during two different seasonal periods (February–April and May–June). Exposures of smoker and non-smoker subjects were compared. The highest BaP exposures were those of smokers during the cold period (2.20±0.84 ng/m3). During this same period, the BaP exposure for non-smoker subjects was 1.00±0.32 ng/m3. Both smoker and non-smoker exposures showed a seasonal dependence, with the lowest values occurring in the warm period (smokers: 1.46±0.72 ng/m3, non-smokers: 0.65±0.25 ng/m3). Compared to the cold period, the warm period produced a nearly 35% reduction in BaP exposures in both smoker and non-smoker subjects. A linear correlation was observed between personal exposures and number of cigarettes smoked daily. An increase in average daily BaP exposure of 0.071±0.009 ng/m3 for every cigarette, due to passive smoke, was calculated. Mean BaP concentrations calculated from fixed monitoring stations were nearly 40% higher than mean personal exposures of non-smoker newsagents.