Abstract:
Milk is very common in our food list due to its nutrient value, since it is a source of vitamins and a lot of mineral constituents which are necessary for proper development and functioning of different tissues and organs. For this reason, milk should be free from any contaminants such as heavy metals. In the past decades, heavy metal contamination has exponentially increased, and is now found particularly high in ingestible beverages such as milk. Thus, this study attempted to assess the potential risk of heavy metal exposure from the dietary consumption of full cream liquid, powdered and flavored milks and its environmental impact and decide which is safer for human consumption and compare the results to the APTWI standards. Focus was given to toxic metals; Lead, Cadmium and chromium as well as non toxic metals; Iron, Manganese, Nickel, Zinc, Copper, Cobalt and Tin, which were digested and processed using typical methods, then analyzed using ICP-OES technique. The results showed that the elements that were found in 100% of the samples analyzed were Iron (Fe), Manganese (Mn) and Tin (Sn). Iron (Fe) has the highest mean concentration in all the samples with the highest being; 29.5859 mg/kg for powder milk. Manganese is the second element with the highest mean concentration in all the samples with the highest being; 1.01116 mg/kg for chocolate milk and the third is Tin with highest being 1.2255mg/kg for powder milk.
