Assessment and health risk study of some heavy metals in instant soup and chicken stock products from Jordanian market

As a result of different human activities in different industrial and agricultural fields, heavy metal toxicity increases day by day. Some of these metals pose a severe threat to the human body, even if these are present in low quantities. These metals are therefore, referred as human carcinogens according to the United States of Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) because they damage the organs in the human body as a result of their non-degradable nature, ability to accumulate, and having prolonged biological half-lives. There are many routes through which toxic heavy metals can enter the human body, including polluted water and soil and dietary intake. New food products have been widely spread out such as instant soup noodle products which are manufactured from different types of vegetables and spices and subjected to industrial processes. As a result, contaminations by some heavy metals is possible. The objective of this study was to assess the content of Manganese (Mn), Chromium (Cr), Cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) in different branded chicken stock powder from Jordanian market. The analytical method was based on the digestion of different types of chicken stock samples prior to their Atomic Absorption Spectrometry analysis. The selected heavy metal concentrations ranged from 0.0407 to 1.08, 0.0211 to 0.592, 0.0134 to 0.0923 and 0.227 to 0.645 mg/kg for Mn, Cr, Cd and Pb, respectively. The maximum levels of Pb and Cd were detected in different brands of powdered soup products. The results found were within the accepted levels compared to food samples from reported research. In order to assess the health effects of the selected heavy metals, a scientific survey was performed on a group of people to assess the daily intake of the studied soup products. As a result, Health Risk Assessment (HRA) was evaluated from the estimated daily intake (EDI) of metals from the selected food samples. The obtained results showed that the selected food samples are quite safe and healthy according to the maximum recommended metal levels taken by humans.