Sub-Chronic Potential Effects of Opera Fungicide on Hematological and Liver Functions Parameters of Female Albino Rats

Opera is a fungicide formulation contains a mixture of two-compounds, epoxiconazole and pyraclostrobin at the ratio of 50 and 133 g/L, respectively. This fungicide is widely applied in grain protection. However, details of Opera effects on
liver biomarkers enzymes, hepatotoxicity, immunotoxicity and hematotoxicity have not been fully investigated. In this study, female albino rats were administered 287 mg/L Opera concentration in the water along 90 days (group I). The second group (group II) was administered 287 mg/L Opera for 90 days in drinking water, followed by untreated water for extra 30 days as a post exposure period. Our experiments revealed that this fungicide was able to induce some liver biomarker enzymes by elevated levels of alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and total antioxidants capacity (TAC) in plasma. While treatment decreased significantly the alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) activities and did not change catalase (CAT) during exposure period (90 days).The effect of Opera on hematological constituents; white blood cells (WBC), [total count and differential; lymphocytes (Lymph %), monocytes (Mon %) and granulocytes (Gran %)], red blood cells (RBC), hemoglobin (HGB), hematocrit (HCT), platelets (PLT) and plateletcrit (PCT). Erythrocyte indices including mean corpuscular volume (MCV), mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH), mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC), red blood cells distribution width (RDW), platelet distribution width (PDW), and  mean platelets volume (MPV) of rats were also investigated under laboratory conditions. Results showed that Operatreated group had a significantly higher in WBC count, Lymph%, Mon%, PLT, MCV, PCT and RDW. While, significantly lower in Gran% RBC, MPV, HCT% and PDW%. Our data showed that Opera at 287mg/L could suppress immune system in rat. This study may be helpful to determine the future risks of diseases in people who have been working with this fungicide.