Toxicity Profile for Vinyl acetate (1991)

Abstract

The long-term administration of vinyl acetate in the drinking-water of rats generated suspicions of carcinogenic activity, possibly inducing tumours of the thyroid, uterus and liver. An unpublished study of a similar protocol has apparently produced no equivalent evidence of carcinogenicity. In unpublished long-term studies involving inhalation exposure to rats and mice, nasal tumours developed in rats. Evidence of genotoxicity has been obtained in several screening assays with mammalian cells in culture, and chromosomal damage and sperm abnormalities were induced in mice given vinyl acetate by intraperitoneal injection. No mutagenicity was seen in Ames bacterial assays. Administration in the drinking-water has been reported to reduce the fertility of male rats, and sperm count was reduced in mice that had received intraperitoneal injections. Vinyl acetate exhibited a fairly low acute systemic toxicity by the oral, dermal and inhalation routes when administered to laboratory animals. It was an irritant to the eye, skin and respiratory tract of man.