Considerations of Human Health Risk Assessment in Chemical Accident: Suggestions from a Toxicogenomic Approach

Abstract

Evolution of industrial technologies is accelerating the usage of diverse chemicals in manufacturing processes and improving the risk of leakage by chemical accidents. Many institutes and organizations have pursued the prevention proper response against chemical accidents. Human health risk assessment aims to evaluate of the nature and probability of adverse health effects in humans who may be exposed to hazards in a contaminated environmental media. However, the risk assessment in chemical accidents has limitations caused by physical complications during the accident, difficulty in predicting the environmental fate of the target chemical, consideration of geometry in modeling program, and other factors. In this review, we suggest a toxicogenomic approach to overcome these aforementioned weak points in human health risk assessment in chemical accidents. The approach is explained using some toxic chemicals that indicate high accident rates. Even though this toxicogeomic database approach needs further validation studies as well as data quality assessment before being applied to actual risk assessments, our suggestions provide important clues for improving quality and accuracy of the existing human health risk assessment process, especially in cases of chemical accidents that need appropriate a response or prediction. © 2018, Korean Society of Environmental Risk Assessment and Health Science and Springer Nature B.V.