Risks assessment of toxic metals in canned meat and chicken

Overview

Morshdy and colleagues measured lead, cadmium, total arsenic, total mercury, aluminium, and tin in canned beef, canned corned beef, and canned chicken luncheon sold in Sharkia Governorate, Egypt. The study reports product-category concentration summaries on a mg/kg wet weight (PPM) basis for n = 20 samples per category. It also calculates EDI, HQ, and HI values for Egyptian adult consumption assumptions; those exposure calculations are source-side context and are kept separate from the occurrence table.

Key numbers

• Article identity: Food Research 7 (1), pages 151 - 157, DOI 10.26656/fr.2017.7(1).710; received 9 October 2021, accepted 11 February 2022, available online 3 February 2023.
• Sample frame: 60 samples total, collected from grocery stores and hypermarkets in Sharkia Governorate, Egypt from April to October 2020; 20 samples each of canned beef, canned corned beef, and canned chicken luncheon.
• Detection limits (µg/g): Pb 0.01, Cd 0.005, As 0.02, Hg 0.01, Sn 0.02, and Al 0.10. The source says detected levels were expressed as µg/g wet weight (µg/g WW) while Table 1 reports mg/kg wet weight (PPM).
• Table 1, canned beef (mg/kg wet weight (PPM), n = 20): Pb positive 20 (100%), minimum 0.06, maximum 0.58, mean ± SE 0.35±0.04; Cd positive 17 (85%), minimum ND, maximum 0.10, mean 0.073±0.006; tAs positive 13 (65%), minimum ND, maximum 0.42, mean 0.24±0.01.
• Table 1, canned beef (mg/kg wet weight (PPM), n = 20): tHg positive 15 (75%), minimum ND, maximum 0.09, mean 0.075±0.003; Al positive 20 (100%), minimum 0.13, maximum 8.21, mean 3.92±0.53; Sn positive 20 (100%), minimum 0.9, maximum 11.62, mean 4.55±0.53.
• Table 1, canned corned beef (mg/kg wet weight (PPM), n = 20): Pb positive 20 (100%), minimum 0.08, maximum 0.61, mean 0.39±0.04; Cd positive 20 (100%), minimum 0.03, maximum 0.12, mean 0.081±0.007; tAs positive 17(85%), minimum ND, maximum 0.48, mean 0.28±0.02.
• Table 1, canned corned beef (mg/kg wet weight (PPM), n = 20): tHg positive 16 (80%), minimum ND, maximum 0.11, mean 0.086±0.003; Al positive 20 (100%), minimum 0.15, maximum 7.95, mean 4.02±0.49; Sn positive 20 (100%), minimum 1.18, maximum 12.36, mean 5.05±0.62.
• Table 1, canned chicken luncheon (mg/kg wet weight (PPM), n = 20): Pb positive 18 (90%), minimum ND, maximum 0.45, mean 0.21±0.02; Cd positive 16 (80%), minimum ND, maximum 0.11, mean 0.071±0.007; tAs positive 15 (75%), minimum ND, maximum 0.44, mean 0.27±0.02.
• Table 1, canned chicken luncheon (mg/kg wet weight (PPM), n = 20): tHg positive 13 (65%), minimum 1.19, maximum 11.62, mean 4.51±0.55; Al positive 20 (100%), minimum 2.5, maximum 12.36, mean 5.05±0.62; Sn positive 20 (100%), minimum 1.14, maximum 10.50, mean 4.59±0.49.
• Table 1 acceptability counts by the source’s comparison limits: Pb 4 (20%), 3 (15%), and 7 (35%); Cd 8 (40%), 5 (25%), and 9 (45%); tAs 6 (30%), 5 (25%), and 9 (45%); tHg 5 (25%), 4(20%), and 7 (35%); Al 3 (15%), 2 (10%), and 4 (20%); Sn 20 (100%) for all three product groups.
• Table 2 EDI/HQ/HI: canned beef Pb EDI 0.273, HQ 0.068; Cd 0.057, 0.057; tAs 0.195, 0.648; tHg 0.059, 0.118; Al 3.060, 0.0031; Sn 3.520, 0.0058; HI 0.900.
• Table 2 EDI/HQ/HI: canned corned beef Pb EDI 0.311, HQ 0.078; Cd 0.063, 0.063; tAs 0.220, 0.735; tHg 0.067, 0.135; Al 3.144, 0.0032; Sn 3.940, 0.0065; HI 1.021.
• Table 2 EDI/HQ/HI: canned chicken luncheon Pb EDI 0.148, HQ 0.037; Cd 0.049, 0.049; tAs 0.187, 0.622; tHg 0.047, 0.093; Al 2.574, 0.0026; Sn 3.130, 0.0052; HI 0.809. Table 2 defines EDI as µg/kg/day.

Methods (brief)

The authors collected 20 samples each of canned beef, canned corned beef, and canned chicken luncheon from Sharkia Governorate retail outlets and stored them at room temperature until extraction. One gram of each sample was digested with 5 mL digestion solution containing 3 mL nitric acid 65% and 2 perchloric acids 70%, held at room temperature for 12 hrs, heated at 70 oC for 3 hrs with swirling every 30 mins, diluted with 20 mL DDW, filtered, and held for measurement. Pb, Cd, Al, and Sn were measured by graphite furnace atomic absorption spectroscopy; As and Hg were measured by hydride generation/cold vapour atomic absorption spectroscopy. DORM-3 fish protein reference material was used for quality assurance.

Implications

Certification (HMTc): This is direct occurrence evidence for canned/processed beef and chicken products in the Egyptian retail market on the source’s mg/kg wet weight (PPM) basis. Arsenic is total arsenic and mercury is total mercury; the page does not treat them as inorganic arsenic or methylmercury.

Courses: The source is useful for teaching product-category aggregation without brand attribution. It also shows why table/prose consistency checks matter: the PDF’s Table 1 and narrative paragraphs disagree for some canned chicken luncheon Hg/Al values.

App: The study can support canned meat and poultry context cards for Egypt, including the source’s product-level means, ranges, detection counts, and HI values.

Wiki pages this source may touch

• Lead
• Cadmium
• Arsenic, Total
• Mercury, Total
• Aluminum
• Tin
• Beef
• Chicken
• Meat and poultry
• Meat and Poultry
• Processed meats (sausage, deli meat, bacon, hot dogs)
• Beef
• Poultry (chicken, turkey, duck)
• Commission Regulation (EC) No 1881/2006 setting maximum levels for certain contaminants in foodstuffs
• EU Regulation 2018/73 - Mercury-compound MRLs in food and feed

Verification notes

• PDF text was extracted with pdftotext -layout to /tmp/mfk_june8_584.txt; Table 1 was also visually checked from a rendered PDF page image because the text layer was difficult to read. The article identity block, sample collection, preparation, analytical procedures, quality assurance, Table 1, Table 2, and conclusion were checked against this page.
• DOI 10.26656/fr.2017.7(1).710, title text, raw handle MFK_risks-assessment-of-toxic-metals-in-canned-meat, and candidate cite-key morshdy2023-canned-meat-chicken-metals were searched before creation; no existing source page was found.
• Units and basis are copied from the source. Table 1 values are reported as mg/kg wet weight (PPM) and Table 2 EDI values as µg/kg/day; no conversion was performed.
• Speciation: arsenic is total arsenic (tAs), mercury is total mercury (tHg), and tin is total tin (Sn) as reported by element. The study does not measure inorganic arsenic, methylmercury, or organotin species.
• Source-internal inconsistency: Table 1 prints canned chicken luncheon tHg as minimum 1.19, maximum 11.62, mean 4.51±0.55, and Al as minimum 2.5, maximum 12.36, mean 5.05±0.62. The surrounding prose instead says Hg was ND to 0.08 with mean 0.068±0.003 and Al was 0.13 to 8.29 with mean 3.54±0.54. This page preserves the visually checked Table 1 values and flags the inconsistency.
• Brand firewall: no product brand names are reported. Values are summarized only at product-category level.
• Frontmatter slugs were checked against docs/gpt-collaboration/taxonomy-snapshot.md. The taxonomy has no exact canned-beef, corned-beef, or chicken-luncheon product slug, so products route through processed-meats, beef-product, and poultry-product; exact product forms remain matrix descriptors and source text.

Update history

The five most recent substantive edits to this page, classified major (evidence or structure moved), correction (a published value or statement was wrong and has been fixed), or minor (narrative rewritten without changing the underlying evidence). Each description is derived from what the edit did to this page; the linked commit is the authoritative record, routine regeneration passes are excluded, and the full version history lives in git. When DOI minting comes online (see schema docs), each entry below will also link to a version-pinned DataCite DOI.