What is Toluene?

Toluene is a colorless liquid with a distinctive sweet and pungent smell.  It is produced during the process of making gasoline and other fuels from crude oil, in making coke from coal, and as a by-product in the manufacture of styrene.  Toluene is used in making paints, paint thinners, fingernail polish, lacquers, adhesives, and rubber in some printing and leather tanning processes.

Common Sources of Exposure

• By using (or sniffing) adhesives or solvents.
• High exposures can occur at home or outdoors when using gasoline, or certain nail polishes, rubber cements, paints, paint thinners, brush cleaners, stain removers, fabric dyes, inks or adhesives.
• Some employees may be exposed to toluene in workplace air.
• Drinking contaminated water or breathing air near waste sites and  landfills may lead to high exposures
• People are also exposed to toluene by breathing cigarette smoke.

How Can Toluene Affect Your Health?

Toluene is a known carcinogen.  Toluene affects the brain.  Low-to-moderate levels from long-term exposure can cause tiredness, confusion, weakness, drunken-type actions, memory loss, nausea and loss of appetite, and hearing loss.  Inhaling a high level of toluene in a short time can make you feel light-headed, dizzy or sleepy.  It can cause unconsciousness, and even death.  Repeated exposure to high levels can cause permanent brain and speech damage, vision and hearing problems, loss of muscle control, and poor balance.  It can also cause memory loss and decreased mental ability. 

Babies have neurological problems and retarded growth and development if their mothers breathe high levels (and possibly low levels) of Toluene during pregnancy.