[Twenty-eight days repeated dose toxicity test of N-(fluorodichloromethylthio)phthalimide in rats]

N-(Fluorodichloromethylthio)phthalimide (Fluor-folpet) has been widely used as an anti-mold and anti-bacterial agent. In this study, 28 days repeated-dose oral toxicity study of fluor-folpet was carried out in Slc:Wistar rats. An oral toxicity study for fluor-folpet, the twenty-eight days test, repeated-dose, oral administration, was performed as follows: Five week-old rats, male and female, 10 rats, each/group, were treated with intragastric administration of fluor-folpet with a dose of 0 (1% Sodium CMC, control), 20, 80 and 320 mg/kg, body weight. Recovery test, for 14 days after the last treatment, was examined for the control and the 320 mg/kg groups. The 320 mg/kg groups, both males and females, showed significantly reduced their body-weight gain compared with the control group. In the 320 mg/kg group, five out of 20 male rats and four out of 20 female rats died from dyspnea during the treatment period. In the female rats in the 320 mg/kg group, serum ChE level was decreased to 50% of control level and gamma-GT was increased in a dose-dependent manner, but these serum levels recovered after 14 days non-treatment period. No histopathological change, relating to the treatment, in liver was observed. Increased weight of the kidney and vacuolation in renal tubules were found in both sexes of 320 mg/kg group. Hyperkeratosis and hyperplasia of the stomach epithelium were observed at the dose more than 80 mg/kg in male, and more than 20 mg/kg in female. A supplemental study, repeated-dose, oral administration in rats carried out to examine the dyspnea revealed that severe acute toxic damages in epithelium of nasal cavity and meatus nasopharyngeus were induced by intragastric administration of fluor-folpet. Fluor-folpet is shown to be cytotoxic. In conclusion, the no-observed-effect level (NOEL) for fluor-folpet was not found under the experimental conditions employed in this repeated-dose toxicity study.