title: Variability and uncertainty assessment of patulin exposure for preschool children in Flanders.
abstract: The objective of the present study was to evaluate the patulin exposure of children consuming organic, handcrafted or conventional apple juice through a probabilistic approach and to evaluate the effectiveness of several risk management options aiming to reduce the risk for children due to patulin exposure. However, a large part of the data on patulin contamination of apple juice fell under the limit of detection (LOD). Different methods were tested to deal with these so-called left censored data and a uniform distribution with uncertain bounds was selected to handle this censorship. Variability and uncertainty assessment of patulin exposure showed that 0.9% [90% confidence interval (CI): 0.3-1.8%] of the children consuming only organic apple juice exceed the tolerable daily intake (TDI). For consumers of conventional and handcrafted apple juice this was respectively 0.1% [90% CI: 0-0.3%] and 0% [90% CI: 0-0.2%]. Reduction of the patulin contamination in apple juice to concentrations below 25 microg/kg reduced the percentage of the children exceeding the TDI to 0% [90%CI: 0-0.2%] for organic apple juice. Reduction of the apple juice consumption was less effective than a reduction of the patulin concentration in apple juice and is only useful when the patulin concentration of apple juice is below 25 microg/kg.
authors: Department of Food Safety and Food Quality, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium.
authors: Katleen
authors: K
authors: Baert
authors: Bruno
authors: B
authors: De Meulenaer
authors: Frederik
authors: F
authors: Verdonck
authors: Inge
authors: I
authors: Huybrechts
authors: Stefaan
authors: S
authors: De Henauw
authors: Peter A
authors: PA
authors: Vanrolleghem
authors: Johan
authors: J
authors: Debevere
authors: Frank
authors: F
authors: Devlieghere
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture / Q000379:methods*; D001530:Belgium; D001628:Beverages / Q000032:analysis*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003257:Consumer Product Safety; D004781:Environmental Exposure; D005260:Female; D005506:Food Contamination / Q000032:analysis*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D027845:Malus / Q000737:chemistry*; D009010:Monte Carlo Method; D009153:Mutagens / Q000032:analysis*; D010365:Patulin / Q000032:analysis*
chemical_list: D009153:Mutagens; D010365:Patulin