KARACHI, July 4: According to the findings of a recent study conducted in the country, a significant portion of fertilizer factory workers was found to be at risk of falling a prey to malignant and non-malignant prostrate diseases.

The study was conducted at the Immunoassay Laboratory of MINAR, Multan, from June 2002 to Jan 2004. The objective of the study was to find the effects of fertilizer factory environment on the serum prostatic specific antigen (PSA) levels.

The summery of the study has been published in a recent Journal of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, Pakistan, Karachi. A total of 205 male workers, of 22-56 year age, at the Pak Arab Fertilizer Factory, Multan, had their PSA level tested.

The workers, belonging to various professional groups and mostly on normal local diet, had been residing and working in the factory area for a period ranging between five to 30 years.

The PSA levels were also estimated in 118 normal persons to serve as a control group. The age of these workers varied from 19 to 64 years. The group mostly comprised hospital staff and ordinary people residing out of the factory area, having no prostatic disease history, the study said.

The study says that increasing size of industrial area in the country has led to toxic environmental pollution, which could cause deadly diseases including cancers.

Generally, the pollutants in a fertilizer factory are classified as gas (smoke and photochemical oxidants), liquid (chromates, ammonia, chlorine, oils and lubricants, sewage and urea) and solid (chromates sludge, lime sludge and urea dust).

These pollutants could cause problems in upper and lower respiratory tract, lung and skin cancers besides heart diseases, the report said. Suggesting further studies, to see which chemicals were responsible for prostrate disease, it stated that it was the fifth common cause of cancer and the second most common cause of deaths from cancer.

Referring to the study, the report said that 12 out of 205 workers showed high PSA levels. Comparatively high PSA levels in some working groups indicated that safety conditions were not the same in all sections of the factory, it concluded. -PPI