Analyses of lead, mercury and cadmium in tissues from seal and fish have shown high concentrations of mercury and cadmium. A toxicological evaluation of the actual concentrations has revealed that in some districts of Greenland, the population may exceed the provisionally tolerable weekly intake (WHO, 1977) of cadmium with from 2 to 20 times and of mercury with from 2 to 40 times. Lead intake was below the provisionally tolerable weekly intake. As these high dietary intakes might have adverse health effects in the consumers, an investigation was undertaken in order to evaluate the human exposure as reflected in blood and hair concentrations. Five districts in Greenland and a control group of Greenlanders living in Denmark have been examined.

A total of 144 persons (including the control group) have participated. Samples were taken in September and October 1979.

Mercury. Strong evidence was found for a connection between mercury exposure and seal-eating. The mercury levels found indicate that the exposure calculated from food analyses is overestimated, but still the most highly exposed groups are on an exposure level where subclinical effects may be anticipated.

Camium. In general the blood cadmium concentrations are higher in Greenland than in Denmark, but the groups in Greenland were found to be very similar. In hair concentrations no differences between the groups were observed. Separation of data on blood cadmium between smokers and non-smokers showed the differences between the mean values to be highly significant. In spite of the presumably higher dietary intake, no influence on blood concentrations could be observed. Contrary to blood, hair reflected dietary intake but not smoking. The results indicate that neither blood nor hair as only parameter reflects total cadmium exposure.

A positively significant correlation was demonstrated between lead and cadmium concentrations in hair, but not in blood.

Lead. Blood concentrations were found to be at the same level as found in Western European countries, but all to be below the limit of 35 µg/100 ml which is the upper individual limit in the EEC-countries.

The highest blood-values were found in the two northern districts, where the level is significantly higher than the level in the two southern districts. The difference was found to be related to varying eating habits, also smoking habits were found to be reflected in blood and hair. Blood was found to be a better index medium than hair for evaluating lead exposure.

Selenium. A potentially toxicity-modifying micronutrient selenium was determined in a limited number of hair samples. No evidence of a high selenium intake could be provided.

Further research is needed especially concerning mercury exposure. Concerning lead and cadmium, the levels found are well below what is regarded a critical level. As, however, the concentrations are on the same level as those found in industrialized countries, follow-up studies seem to be needed in order to observe trends of exposure.