Investigation and human health risk assessment of multi-class veterinary antibiotics in honey from South Korea

Abstract

Antibiotic residues in honey constitute potential threats to human health. To ensure food safety, a total of 26 antibiotics method based on liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry for the determination of antibiotics was validated in honey. Sample preparation consists in acid hydrolysis and dispersive-solid phase extract clean-up methods. The primary secondary amine sorbent yielded the highest recoveries. All antibiotics showed good linearity, with correlation coefficients of more than 0.993. The method yielded limits of detection of 0.1–6.8 μg L−1, limits of quantification (LOQ) of 0.3–20.7 μg L−1, and recoveries of 70.5–107.4 %. The concentrations of individual antibiotics except chlortetracycline and tetracycline were below 100 ng mL−1. The chlortetracycline (38.2 %) and tetracycline (31.3 %) accounted for the highest antibiotic residues in honey samples. The estimation of exposure and risk assessment revealed that the upper residue levels of tetracycline-class exceeded the acceptable daily intake by 24.3–381.5 times. In particular, chlortetracycline alone accounted for 70 % of the hazard index, which was 4.62 in children and 2.26 in adults. This study calls attention to the human health risk of tetracyclines in honey consumption.