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Toxic heavy metals in the muscle of roe deer (Capreolus capreolus)—food toxicological significance

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Abstract

The study was performed on 20 (10 males, 10 females) roe deer (Capreolus capreolus) to investigate the concentration of cadmium, lead, mercury, and arsenic in the muscle tissue. They reside in forest and meadow, about 50 km distance from industrial activities and traffic. Samples were taken from the musculus biceps femoris of each deer without external contamination after shooting during the regular hunting season on a hunting area close to Eger in Hungary. The determination of heavy metal contents was carried out by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES). The statistical analysis was performed by statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) version 11.0. The measured residue concentration of cadmium was below the limit of detection in the roe deer meat indicating no health risk for the consumers. The average lead concentration (0.48 ± 0.21 mg/kg wet weight) exceeded the regulated maximum limit, but its calculated weekly intake was below the provisional tolerable weekly intake (PTWI). The residue level of mercury is not regulated and the average mercury content of roe deer meat (0.87 ± 0.40 mg/kg wet weight) was about half of PTWI, but the consumption of meat with the highest detected concentrations results in higher PTWI than recommended. The measured concentration of arsenic (0.27 ± 0.20 mg/kg wet weight) in the roe deer meat may not pose any health risk for the human consumers according to the PTWI set by the World Health Organization.

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Acknowledgement

This research was supported by the 8525-5/2014/TUDPOL grant of the Hungarian Ministry of Human Resources.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Food Hygiene, Faculty of Veterinary Science, Szent István University, Budapest, Hungary

    József Lehel, Péter Laczay & Katalin Lányi

  2. National Food Chain Safety Office, Budapest, Hungary

    Adrienn Gyurcsó

  3. Institute of Wildlife Management and Vertebrata Zoology, Faculty of Forestry, University of West Hungary, Sopron, Hungary

    Ferenc Jánoska

  4. Károly Róbert Public Nonprofit Ltd. Laboratory, Atkár, Tass-puszta, H-3213, Hungary

    Szilvia Majoros

  5. Department of Exotic Animal and Wildlife Medicine, Faculty of Veterinary Science, Szent István University, Budapest, Hungary

    Miklós Marosán

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  1. József Lehel
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  2. Péter Laczay
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  3. Adrienn Gyurcsó
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  4. Ferenc Jánoska
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  7. Miklós Marosán
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Correspondence to József Lehel.

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Lehel, J., Laczay, P., Gyurcsó, A. et al. Toxic heavy metals in the muscle of roe deer (Capreolus capreolus)—food toxicological significance. Environ Sci Pollut Res 23, 4465–4472 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-015-5658-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-015-5658-1

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