Overview
Gajek and colleagues measured 23 elements by ICP-MS, ICP-OES and cold-vapor AAS in 73 samples: commercial and home-made ciders, flavored beer-based low-alcohol drinks (radlers) and two apple juices. Table 4 summarizes all samples, Table 5 gives ranges for ciders and for the beer-based drinks, and Table 6 compares home-made with commercial ciders. A packaging test on one cider brand found differences in copper, manganese and sodium between cans and bottles.
Key numbers
- Lead: <LOD to 17.05 µg/L in ciders and <LOD to 16.93 µg/L in beer-based drinks; all-sample median 2.114 µg/L (Tables 4-5).
- Cadmium: 0.097 to 3.074 µg/L in ciders and 0.046 to 0.422 µg/L in beer-based drinks (Table 5).
- Nickel: home-made cider median 188.4 µg/L versus commercial cider 59.60 µg/L (Table 6).
- Mercury below the detection limit in every sample (Table 4).
Methods (brief)
Samples were degassed and digested with nitric acid in a microwave system, with indium as internal standard and triplicate readings. Detection limits are not printed in the main text, and validation is described only by reference to earlier work.
Evidence Fitness
A moderate, market-based dataset with per-group statistics but no printed detection limits. Lead exceeded the drinking-water value of 10 µg/L in 45 samples but no alcoholic-beverage limit. These are fermented low-alcohol drinks, a proxy for whiskey only, so the whiskey page is not linked; the beer-based drinks are flavored mixtures, not plain beer. Results are per litre and are not comparable with mg/kg food values.