Quantitative risk assessment for formalin treatment in fish preservation: food safety concern in local market of Bangladesh

Abstract

In Bangladesh, fishes are adulterated by hazardous chemicals at different steps from farm to consumers. Formalin (FA) is reported to be frequently added as preservative either by dipping or spraying to the fresh fishes by the fish traders while transporting to domestic marketing chain to prevent spoilage and extend shelf life. Thus, the objective of the present study was toconduct quantitative risk assessment (QRA) for formalin treated fish in Bangladesh. The probabilistic QRA of formalin treated fish was performed based on available secondary data.Availabledata on concentration of formalin in fish, daily fish consumption by the consumer and their body weight were used to estimate the risk of residual formalin to the consumers. Based on the data, three different scenarios (average consumption, two and four times of average consumption considered as scenarios 1, 2 and 3, respectively) were used for exposure analysis using @Risk program version 6.0.FA concentration in consumedfresh and cooked (boiling) fish was 5.34x10-02 and 2.340x10-02 (mg/kg bw/day), respectively and national average fish consumption was 200 g/day. QRA reveals that FA intake under scenario1 and 2 was lower than acceptable daily intake (ADI 0.2 mg/kg bw/day set by the United States Environmental Protection Agency) thus lower risk observed for both fresh and cooked fish. However, scenario 3 revealed that 0.01 % population was at risk (FA intake 0.21 mg/kg bw/day higher than ADI) upon the fresh fish consumption, where cooked fish (FA 9.38x10-02 mg/kg bw/day) consumer remains safe at the same scenario. The result confirmed that cooking has significant effect to reduction of formalin. Therefore, probabilistic quantitative risk assessment of formalin treated fish could provide important risk information to the risk manager (government), whether the population is at risk or not? The result could be applied to establish effective risk management strategy in Bangladesh.