Health Risk Assessment of Benzoic Acid Intake through Consumption of Creamy Cakes in Gonabad, Iran

Benzoic acid, a food preservative, can cause serious human health risks. The purpose of this study was to investigate benzoic acid in samples of cream cakes sold in Gonabad market. In this regard, ten most commonly using brands of cake producers were selected and then, 4 cake samples from each brand were analyzed to measure their benzoic acid content and to estimate the associated human health risk. The chronic daily intake (CDI) and target hazard quotient (HQ) values of benzoic acid were calculated. The mean concentration of benzoic acid in cream cake samples was 2.13mg/kg. The highest concentration was detected in one brand with the amount of 4.38mg/kg. Generally, the use of benzoic acid as a food preservative in cakes is not allowed, but it was detected in 76.3% of the cake samples studied. Dietary intakes of benzoic acid is well below the ADI for both children and adults. The results showed that the health risk caused by the intake of benzoic acid from different brands of creamy cakes was in the range of 0-0.006 (mean 0.0032) and 0-0.0013 (mean 0.0006) for children and adults, respectively, indicating no health risk from the consumption of cakes containing this preservative.