Cancer risk and disease burden of dietary acrylamide exposure in China, 2016

Acrylamide is widely found in food as a side-product of high-temperature heating of starch-rich food. It has attracted much attention because of its neurotoxicity and carcinogenicity. However, the cancer risk and disease burden of dietary acrylamide exposure have not been quantified in China. To estimate the cancer risk and the disease burden attributable to dietary acrylamide exposure and quantify its health hazards. We first performed an exposure assessment of acrylamide in food, based on which the incremental excess lifetime cancer risk (ELCR) was calculated for cancer risk assessment. The DisMod Ⅱ software and the DALY calculator in R were used to calculate the disease burden due to dietary acrylamide exposure. Average dietary acrylamide exposure in males was 0.1531 μg·kg−1·d−1 and that in females was 0.1554 μg·kg−1·d−1, resulting in an ELCR of 7.81 × 10−5 for males and 7.92 × 10−5 for females in China. The dietary acrylamide exposure resulted in about 23,688.09 DALYs of cancers among the Chinese population in 2016, including 1331.93 DALYs of breast cancer, 243.32 DALYs of endometrial cancer, 248.91 DALYs of ovarian cancer, and 176.28 DALYs of kidney cancer, respectively. The health hazards of dietary acrylamide exposure deserve attention. The burden of disease assessment could quantify the health hazards of food contaminants for prioritizing policies. [Display omitted] •The daily acrylamide exposure was estimated in the Chinese population.•The cancer risk from dietary acrylamide exposure was assessed among Chinese.•The dietary acrylamide exposure resulted in about 23,688.09 DALYs of cancers.•A model to assess the cancer burden attributed to dietary acrylamide was provided.