efsa-opinion-chromium-food-drinking-water

Drinking water
Bottle water
Chromium in food and drinking water
71 corresponded to still mineral water and 5 to unspecified bottled water. The minimum concentration
of Cr(VI) reported in the quantified samples was 0.1 µg/L (LB = UB), and the maximum 36.0 µg/L
(LB = UB).
Among the 46 146 samples available. tap water samples were the most reported (60.6 %) with mean
occurrence values of 0.2 µg/L and 1.9 µg/L at the LB and the UB, respectively (Table 7). Taking into
account all bottled water samples (13 162) the mean occurrence values ranged between 0.3 µg/L for
carbonated mineral water (LB) and 3.4 µg/L at the UB reported for unspecified bottled water. Overall,
mean occurrence values at the LB ranged between 0.1 µg/L for water ice and 2.0 µg/L for unspecified
drinking water. At the UB values ranged between 1.9 µg/L for tap water and 3.9 µg/L for well water.
Table 7: Summary statistics of chromium concentrations (µg/L) in the different types of drinking
water (water intended for human consumption and mineral waters). Concentration values (LB and
UB) were reported to one decimal place.
Bottled water
(unspecified)
Carbonated
mineral water
Still mineral
water
N
LC
1 617 84
7 839 94
3 706 88
Concentration (g/L)
LB/UB Mean P25 P50 P75 P95 (a)
LB 0.9 0.0 0.0 0.0 6.7
UB 3.4 1.0 4.0 5.0 6.77
LB 0.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 1.2
UB 2.8 2.0 2.0 3.0 10.0
LB 0.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 4.0
UB 3.2 2.0 2.0 5.0 7.0
Drinking water
LB 2.0 0.0 0.0 1.8 9.3
3 174 55
(unspecified)
UB 2.2 0.3 0.5 2.0 9.3
LB 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Tap water 27 971 96
UB 1.9 1.0 1.0 2.0 5.0
Water ice (for
LB 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 -
21 95
consumption)
UB 2.4 0.3 0.3 5.0 -
LB 1.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 4.0
Well water 1 818 86
UB 3.9 2.0 5.0 5.0 5.0
N: number of samples; LC: left-censored; LB: lower bound; UB: upper bound; P25/50/75/95: 25 th /50 th /75 th /95 th percentile.
(a): The 95 th percentile estimates obtained on dietary surveys/age classes with less than 60 observations may not be
statistically robust (EFSA, 2011b). Those estimates were not included in this table.
Different LOQ cut-offs other than 10 µg/L were assessed on the occurrence values to try to minimize
the gap between LB-UB in the exposure calculations. However, no significant improvements were
obtained without compromising the number of samples and, after all, 10 µg/L was considered as the
most adequate cut-off.
5. Food consumption
5.1. EFSA’s Comprehensive European Food Consumption Database
The EFSA Comprehensive European Food Consumption Database (Comprehensive Database) was
built in 2010 based on information provided by EU Member States and the food consumption data for
children obtained through an EFSA Article 36 project (Huybrechts et al., 2011). The Comprehensive
Database version 1 contains results from a total of 32 16 different dietary surveys carried out in
22 different Member States covering more than 67 000 individuals (EFSA, 2011b). The
Comprehensive Database includes individual food consumption data concerning infants (2 surveys
from 2 countries), toddlers (8 16 surveys from 8 countries), children (16 16 surveys from 14 countries),
16 When counting the total number of available dietary surveys and those for ‘Toddlers’ and ‘Other children’, the three
Germans surveys named as Donald 2006, Donald 2007, and Donald 2008 are counted here as only one survey since they
were carried out using the same methodology (Dietary record). For more details on these surveys see Table C1 in the
Appendix C.
EFSA Journal 2014;12(3):3595 46