Young children may also be exposed if they eat soil that contains carbon tetrachloride. Carbon tetrachloride has been found in water or soil at about 22 percent of the waste sites investigated under Superfund, at concentrations ranging from less than 50 to over 1,000 ppb. People who work with carbon tetrachloride are likely to receive the greatest exposure to the compound. The estimated average daily amount that the general population may drink in water is 0.01 ug. Metabolism Carbon tetrachloride can enter your body through your lungs if you breathe air containing carbon tetrachloride, or through your stomach and intestines if you swallow food or water containing carbon tetrachloride.
Carbon tetrachloride can also pass through the skin into the body.
When you inhale carbon tetrachloride, over 30-40 percent of what you inhale enters your body, where most of it temporarily accumulates in body fat. Some can enter the kidney, liver, brain, lungs, and skeletal muscle. When you drink water contaminated with carbon tetrachloride about 85-91 percent of it can enter your body. Much of the compound that enters your body when you breathe it or drink water contaminated with it leaves your body quickly, and a lot of it can be found in your breath within a few hours. Animal studies also suggest that it may take weeks for the remainder of the compound in the body to be eliminated, especially that which has entered the body fat.