US EPA

1378604 

Technical Report 

Arsenic residues in livers of swine, lamb, and fowl and in eggs 

Knoppler, HO 

1975 

PESTAB/75/2991 

Lebensm 

5 

277-280; 1975 

ger 

PESTAB. The arsenic content of 3,651 swine, 180 lamb, and 175 poultry liver samples, and of 420 egg lots, all collected from Bavarian farms during the 1973-1974 period, was analyzed colorimetrically. The maximum allowable arsenic concentration of 0.5 mg/kg was exceeded in 45 swine liver samples (1.23%), which was due to arsenic treatment of the animals shortly before slaughtering in about 50% of these cases. The arsenic residues were below 0.01 in 1,233 samples. Comparative analyses showed that the arsenic contents in the liver are higher than those in kidneys and meat. The highest arsenic level found in lamb livers was 0.36 mg/kg, i.e., the maximum allowable concentration was not reached in any sample. The arsenic content was below 0.5 mg/kg in all chicken liver samples, while arsenic levels above the maximum allowable concentration of 0.1 mg/kg were found in 1.67% of all egg samples.