Overview
Ahmed and colleagues measured 13 elements, including lead, cadmium, arsenic, nickel, chromium and aluminum, in 100 wheat-based traditional sweets bought from bakeries in Lahore, Pakistan. Ten sweet types made from flour, milk solids, sugar, ghee and nuts were sampled ten times each. Table 2 gives the minimum, maximum and mean for each type, and the paper adds intake and risk estimates.
Key numbers
- Lead means ranged from 0.14 ± 0.03 mg/kg (type SL) to 0.90 ± 0.1 mg/kg (type SB); the highest single value was 2.1 ± 0.2 mg/kg in SB (Table 2, p. 4).
- Cadmium means ranged from 0.16 ± 0.03 mg/kg (SG) to 0.56 ± 0.03 mg/kg (SDB), maximum 1.2 ± 0.1 mg/kg in SL (Table 2, p. 4).
- Arsenic was not detected in any sample (Table 2, p. 4).
- Chromium mean reached 5.7 ± 0.7 mg/kg in SP; nickel mean 1.5 ± 0.1 mg/kg in SL (Table 2, p. 3).
Methods (brief)
Samples were crushed and digested with nitric acid and hydrogen peroxide on a heating mantle at 85 °C. Magnesium, calcium, manganese, iron, copper and zinc were measured by flame AAS; aluminum, chromium, cobalt, nickel, arsenic, cadmium and lead by ICP-OES. NIST SRM 2384 (baked chocolate) gave recoveries of 98.1 to 102.3% for the certified elements, including cadmium and lead (Table 1). LOD and LOQ are only in a supplementary table that was not available.
Evidence Fitness
Ten samples per sweet type with triplicate analysis and a certified reference material, so the occurrence data are usable for this product class. The lead mean for type SL (0.14 mg/kg) is below its own printed minimum (0.15 mg/kg), and some text statements contradict Table 2. Sweets are a proxy only for fruit-snack-candy, wheat-cereal-biscuits and white-cake: none of those foods is measured, and the thin pages are not linked.