Health Risk Assessment And Bioaccessibility Of Toxic Elements In Edible And Medicinal Plants Under Different Consumption Methods

Toxic elements are one of the main sources of the edible and medicinal plants (EMPs) pollutant with harmful impacts on human health due to the accumulative toxicity, non-carcinogenic and carcinogenic risk. Due to the special environmental planting characteristics and processing process, EMPs was inevitably contaminated with various kinds of toxic elements. This study was aimed to investigate the contamination and health risk level of Cu, Hg, As, Cd, Pb, Cr, Ni and Zn in raw material of EMPs, in their water infusion and gastrointestinal digestive juice of human after consumption of EMPs, using an optimized inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry combined with in vitro digestion system. In addition, the potential human health risk was evaluated referring to the maximum residue limit (MRL), bioaccessibility, total target hazard quotients (TTHQs) and lifetime cancer risk (LCR). The data showed that 63% of the edible and medicinal plant was contaminated with Cr and Hg on average level typically above the MRL based on Canadian regulation. Combined with the varied bioaccessibility of different elements in different EMPs and under different consumption methods, total LCR values of cumulative toxic elements in all EMPs samples were within the safe range (CR < 10(-4)) for both adults and children. However, THQ values indicated that As, Hg and Pb posed a slight threaten to non-carcinogenic health risk for adults after consuming the water infusion or solid dietary supplements of EMPs.