Swedish National Food Administration Research Articles

Dietary Exposure to Acrylamide Has Negative Effects on the Gastrointestinal Tract: A Review.

Changing eating habits and an increase in consumption of thermally processed products have increased the risk of the harmful impact of chemical substances in food on consumer health. A 2002 report by the Swedish National Food Administration and scientists at Stockholm University on the formation of acrylamide in food products during frying, baking and grilling contributed to an increase in scientific interest in the subject. Acrylamide is a product of Maillard's reaction, which is a non-enzymatic chemical reaction between reducing sugars and amino acids that takes place during thermal processing. The research conducted over the past 20 years has shown that consumption of acrylamide-containing products leads to disorders in human and animal organisms. The gastrointestinal tract is a complex regulatory system that determines the transport, grinding, and mixing of food, secretion of digestive juices, blood flow, growth and differentiation of tissues, and their protection. As the main route of acrylamide absorption from food, it is directly exposed to the harmful effects of acrylamide and its metabolite-glycidamide. Despite numerous studies on the effect of acrylamide on the digestive tract, no comprehensive analysis of the impact of this compound on the morphology, innervation, and secretory functions of the digestive system has been made so far. Acrylamide present in food products modifies the intestine morphology and the activity of intestinal enzymes, disrupts enteric nervous system function, affects the gut microbiome, and increases apoptosis, leading to gastrointestinal tract dysfunction. It has also been demonstrated that it interacts with other substances in food in the intestines, which increases its toxicity. This paper summarises the current knowledge of the impact of acrylamide on the gastrointestinal tract, including the enteric nervous system, and refers to strategies aimed at reducing its toxic effect.

Insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) and body fat (%) are associated to low intake of fruit and vegetables in Swedish, young adults: the cross-sectional lifestyle, biomarkers and atherosclerosis study

BackgroundIn the cross-sectional Lifestyle, Biomarkers, and Atherosclerosis study (LBA study) we have previously reported a high prevalence (15%) of homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) in Swedish, young adults. The aim of the present study was to report the dietary habits of subjects 18.0–25.9 years, and to associate dietary habits to body composition measures; body mass index (BMI), body fat (%), waist circumference and to HOMA-IR, a risk marker for diabetes.MethodThe subjects (577 women and 257 men) filled in a validated computerized food frequency questionnaire. The questionnaire was based on recommendations from the Swedish national food administration. To associate the dietary habits to BMI, body fat (%), waist circumference and to HOMA-IR the subjects were divided in two groups. Subjects “eating as recommended” and subjects “eating less/more than recommended”.ResultsRecommended intake of fish and seafood (P < 0.05), fruit and vegetables (P < 0.001), and sweets (P < 0.05) were associated to lower HOMA-IR values compared to subjects not eating as recommended. When split by sex no difference in HOMA-IR was detected with recommended intake of fish and seafood, but women eating fish and seafood as recommended had less body fat (%) (P < 0.05) compared to women not eating fish and seafood as recommended. Recommended intake of fruit and vegetables was associated to lower HOMA-IR in women (P < 0.01), and in women and men to less body fat (%) (P < 0.05) compared to subjects not eating the recommended 500 g of fruit and vegetables per day. Both women and men with higher consumption of sweets than recommended had higher HOMA-IR (P < 0.05), but no difference in the body composition measures BMI, body fat (%) or waist circumference compared to subjects eating sweets as recommended.ConclusionThe results highlight the importance of reducing a high intake of sweets and to increase the intake of fish, fruit and vegetables, in young adults, to reduce the risk of future diabetes.

What’s the Latest on Acrylamide?

What’s the Latest on Acrylamide?

ALCOHOL, HEALTH, AND REPRODUCTION

This article analyzes two recent Swedish public health campaigns targeting pregnant women's drinking: A good start, a pamphlet by the Swedish National Institute of Public Health, and Advice about food for you who are pregnant, a brochure by the Swedish National Food Administration. It conceptualizes the public health campaigns as governmental attempts to steer citizens' behavior and behavior-related desires, aspirations, and beliefs toward a certain understanding of normal healthy lifestyle. The public health campaigns are seen as part of larger processes of bio-power. By applying critical discourse analysis, the article, first, asks how drinking during pregnancy is represented in the campaigns as a health risk. Second, it analyses how the pamphlets advise women to take action to restrain from drinking during pregnancy and what kind of knowledge the pamphlets use to legitimate intervening in the women's lifestyles. And finally, it analyses how the pamphlets try to persuade the women to identify with the proposed information and recommendations. The analysis shows that the campaigns construct an intimate partnership between the state and the citizen. By extending the medical public health gaze to reach inside the female body to emphasize how easily fetal development can be disturbed, and by making women's individual lifestyle choices both the cause of and solution to potential damage during fetal development, the pamphlets make mothers solely responsible and culpable for the health status of the fetus. Partners and fathers are practically absent from the campaign pamphlets. Both campaigns bypass the responsibilities of communities and other broad social institutions in preventing drinking during pregnancy. The campaigns, though having many similarities, differ from each other in terms of the kinds of choices they have made in representations, action, and identification.

Acrylamide – Still a matter of concern for fried potato food?*

Acrylamide is a well‐known chemical compound that came into the discussion as food‐borne contaminant in 2002 when the Swedish National Food Administration (NFA) together with the University of Stockholm announced the finding of acrylamide in food for the first time. A lot of research has been done all over the world to elucidate the reaction pathway for the formation of acrylamide during processing, to find mitigation strategies to reduce acrylamide in food and to evaluate the toxicity of acrylamide to humans after consumption of acrylamide containing food. Today, it is known that acrylamide is formed under the conditions of the Maillard reaction with low moisture content and temperature &gt;120°C by the amino acid asparagine in presence of certain α‐dicarbonyl compounds from the Maillard reaction. From this knowledge several set screws became evident for the development of successful mitigation strategies such as choice of appropriate raw material low in precursors, pre‐treatment of the raw material before frying or reducing the frying temperature. Until today no significant correlation between the consumption of acrylamide with food and the occurrence of cancer has been found. The present paper reviews the recent research on these topics with special focus on fried potato food.Practical applications: Formation of acrylamide in fried food is still of concern, and even 12 years after the first communication of acrylamide in processed food a lot of papers are published. The questions of formation, mitigation, toxicity, and exposure are partly answered but on the other side important parts are still open. The paper summarizes the status quo with focus on fried potato products.

Acrylamide Analysis in Food by Liquid Chromatographic and Gas Chromatographic Methods

Acrylamide (AA) is a compound classified as carcinogenic to humans by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. It was first discovered to be present in certain heated processed food by the Swedish National Food Administration (SNFA) and University of Stockholm in early 2002. The major pathway for AA formation in food is the Maillard reaction between reducing sugar and the amino acid asparagine at high temperature. Since the discovery of AA's presence in food, many analytical methods have been developed for determination of AA contents in different food matrices. Also, several studies have been conducted to develop extraction procedures for AA from difficult food matrices. AA is a small, highly polar molecule, which makes its extraction and analysis challenging. Many articles and reviews have been published dealing with AA in food. The aim of the review is to discuss AA formation in food, the factors affecting AA formation and removal, AA exposure assessment, AA extraction and cleanup from food samples, and analytical methods used in AA determination, such as high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and gas chromatography (GC). Special attention is given to sample extraction and cleanup procedures and analytical techniques used for AA determination.

Editorial introductions

Editorial introductions

Editorial introductions

Editorial introductions

Preventing anxiety: a qualitative study of fish consumption and pregnancy

Starting from theories of anxiety as social practice, this article explores the contested landscape of health, risks associated with fish consumption and pregnancy in Sweden, and the way risk communicators and pregnant women navigate this landscape. This article argues that the risk analysis by the Swedish National Food Administration is a good example of the practices of definition and annihilation of subjects and objects of anxiety. It shows that the creation of anxious subjects is counteracted by two means in the brochures and on the website of the National Food Administration (NFA): by placing information about pregnancy and fish within a risk discourse, and by liberal governance. This article concludes that, although pregnant women manage and control anxiety during pregnancy by several practices, this strategy by the NFA does not make them feel safe and secure, which is the basic duty of the NFA, but rather bolsters their feeling that you cannot ever feel safe, you always have to anticipate that something bad might happen.

Can targeted food taxes and subsidies improve the diet? Distributional effects among income groups

This paper analyses distributional effects of revenue-neutral tax reforms aimed at improving dietary quality and encouraging healthier grain consumption. Using data on household grain purchases, we analyse both the impact on dietary quality and the tax incidence among income groups of VAT reforms and excise duty reforms. The VAT reforms include subsidies of healthy products (products labelled with the Swedish National Food Administration’s healthy symbol) funded by increased VAT on ‘less healthy’ products. The excise duty reforms contain a subsidy of fibre content, funded by excise duties on either added sugar or saturated fat. Our results suggest that the VAT reforms have a similar impact on dietary quality across all income groups, with increases in fibre intake, but also unwanted increases in the intake of nutrients frequently overconsumed: fat, salt and sugar. The impact on dietary quality of the VAT reforms is therefore difficult to evaluate. With the exception of the lowest income group, the excise duty reforms seem to have a positive health effect across all other income groups, with increases in the intake of fibre and reductions in the intake of saturated fat, sugar and added sugar. For the lowest income group we find the highest increase in the intake of fibre, but generally an increase in the intake of the other nutrients, too. The excise duty reforms also result in a more energy-dense grain diet, with increases in the intake of calories for all income groups. Both the VAT reforms and the excise duty reforms appear to be progressive. The lowest income group pays less food taxes and generally faces a lower overall post-reform price level. The income group that increases its tax payments most is the one with the highest income. This is also the income group that faces the largest increase in the overall post-reform price level.

Diet &amp; Nutrition: Acrylamide Study Suggests Breast Cancer Link

The International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies acrylamide as a probable human carcinogen. It has only been in recent months that an epidemiologic study first found a link between dietary acrylamide and human cancer risk. Now Danish researchers report that acrylamide adduct levels in blood are associated with an increased risk of breast cancer in postmenopausal women. This is the first epidemiologic study to use blood biomarkers to assess acrylamide exposure. The findings, says first author Pelle Thonning Olesen, emphasize the importance of using biomarkers for exposure assessment. “Biomarkers are a more trustworthy indicator for exposure,” he says. Before 2002, people were known to be exposed to acrylamide in certain industries and through smoking tobacco. That year, the Swedish National Food Administration discovered that acrylamide also forms in fried or baked starchy foods such as french fries, coffee, and baked goods. Diet is now thought to be the major source of exposure among nonsmokers, but the cancer risk posed by acrylamide in food is unknown. All previous epidemiologic trials estimated acrylamide consumption from food frequency questionnaires. Olesen, a toxicologist at the Technical University of Denmark, Soborg, and colleagues instead measured levels of acrylamide and a key metabolite, glycidamide, bound to hemoglobin. The subjects included 374 postmenopausal women with breast cancer and 374 controls who participated in the Danish Cancer Society’s Diet, Cancer, and Health Study. Adduct levels of acrylamide among smokers reflect both dietary and smoking intake of the compound. After statistical adjustments for smoking behavior, women with the highest acrylamide-hemoglobin levels showed a 2.7 times higher risk of estrogen receptor–positive breast cancer compared with women with the lowest acrylamide-hemoglobin levels. The risk rose with increasing acrylamide exposure. Acrylamide-hemoglobin levels were not linked to estrogen receptor–negative breast cancer, and glycidamide-hemoglobin levels showed no connection with any breast cancer. The finding that only acrylamide-hemoglobin was associated with breast cancer suggests that the compound may induce cancer by nongenotoxic routes such as alkylation of proteins that could alter estrogen receptor function. The findings were reported in the 1 May 2008 issue of the International Journal of Cancer. “This is an important study because it’s the first to measure acrylamide adducts,” says epidemiologist Lorelei Mucci, an assistant professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. Nonetheless, the study should be repeated in larger numbers of nonsmoking women, according to Mucci, because more than half the cases and controls were current or former smokers. “The big public health question here is whether the amount of acrylamide in foods is enough to lead to cancer,” Mucci says. It is possible that other chemical compounds formed along with acrylamide may be the culprit in any cancer link. “Acrylamide-hemoglobin may be a biomarker for other carcinogenic chemicals formed during the heating of foods,” cautions Olesen.

Health claims in the labelling and marketing of food products:

Since 1990 certain health claims in the labelling and marketing of food products have been allowed in Sweden within the food sector's Code of Practice. The rules were developed in close dialogue with the authorities. The legal basis was a decision by the authorities not to apply the medicinal products’ legislation to “foods normally found on the dinner table” provided the rules defined in the Code were followed. The Code of Practice lists nine well-established diet–health relationships eligible for generic disease risk reduction claims in two steps and general rules regarding nutrient function claims. Since 2001, there has also been the possibility for using “product-specific physiological claims (PFP)”, subject to premarketing evaluation of the scientific dossier supporting the claim. The scientific documentation has been approved for 10 products with PFP, and another 15 products have been found to fulfil the Code's criteria for “low glycaemic index”. In the third edition of the Code, active since 2004, conditions in terms of nutritional composition were set, i.e. “nutrient profiles”, with a general reference to the Swedish National Food Administration's regulation on the use of a particular symbol, i.e. the keyhole symbol. Applying the Swedish Code of practice has provided experience useful in the implementation of the European Regulation on nutrition and health claims made on foods, effective from 2007.

Health claims in the labelling and marketing of food products: the Swedish food sector's Code of Practice in a European perspective

Since 1990 certain health claims in the labelling and marketing of food products have been allowed in Swedenwithin the food sector’s Code of Practice. The rules were developed in close dialogue with the authorities. Thelegal basis was a decision by the authorities not to apply the medicinal products’ legislation to ‘‘foodsnormally found on the dinner table’’ provided the rules defined in the Code were followed. The Code ofPractice lists nine well-established diethealth relationships eligible for generic disease risk reduction claims intwo steps and general rules regarding nutrient function claims. Since 2001, there has also been the possibilityfor using ‘‘product-specific physiological claims (PFP)’’, subject to premarketing evaluation of the scientificdossier supporting the claim. The scientific documentation has been approved for 10 products with PFP, andanother 15 products have been found to fulfil the Code’s criteria for ‘‘low glycaemic index’’. In the thirdedition of the Code, active since 2004, conditions in terms of nutritional composition were set, i.e. ‘‘nutrientprofiles’’, with a general reference to the Swedish National Food Administration’s regulation on the use of aparticular symbol, i.e. the keyhole symbol. Applying the Swedish Code of practice has provided experienceuseful in the implementation of the European Regulation on nutrition and health claims made on foods,effective from 2007.

Analysis of pesticide residues in fruit and vegetables with ethyl acetate extraction using gas and liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometric detection

A multiresidue method based on extraction with ethyl acetate has been used at the Swedish National Food Administration since 1989 to monitor pesticide residues in fruit and vegetables. The method has been continuously adjusted, resulting in simple and quick analyses of pesticide residues. To recover basic pesticides, the addition of an alkali is necessary. The addition of sodium hydrogen carbonate has been shown to recover all pesticides effectively without any degradation. The liquid chromatography (LC) with tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) technique has made it possible to analyse more polar pesticides and to replace many single methods. The latest development in the multiresidue method, comprising the use of gas chromatography (GC) with MS/MS, has further improved the analysis by replacing the conventional GC detectors. The need for cleanup has been reduced or eliminated entirely. Consequently, the method has been simplified in a way that makes it possible to recover all included analytes in many different matrices in one single extraction and to detect them either with GC-MS/MS or with LC-MS/MS.

Dietary Acrylamide and Cancer Risk in Humans: A Review

In April 2002, researchers from the Swedish National Food Administration reported that they had detected elevated levels of acrylamide in commonly consumed baked and fried foods. Acrylamide is known as a neurotoxin in humans and as a carcinogen in experimental animals, and it is classified as a probable human carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC, 1994). Therefore, the discovery that the compound forms naturally during high-heat cooking of starchy foods caused substantial alarm in Sweden and worldwide. Within months of the initial Swedish report, national governments and food companies began their own investigations on acrylamide in foods and discussed the potential impact of dietary acrylamide on the public’s health. The discovery also provoked public debate among scientists about the importance of the finding because of the relative lack of data in humans on the one hand and the knowledge that acrylamide in high doses is genotoxic in cell and animal studies on the other. Since 2002, researchers have engaged in a wide range of studies spanning across disciplines. In this review, we summarize the current state of knowledge on acrylamide in foods. We discuss the formation and intake of acrylamide in foods, present evidence for carcinogenicity in cell and animal studies, and examine the findings from epidemiological studies of occupational and dietary exposures. We conclude with a discussion of future directions in the field.

A Review of Acrylamide: An Industry Perspective on Research, Analysis, Formation, and Control

Acrylamide is a synthetic monomer with a wide scope of industrial applications, mainly as a precursor in the production of several polymers, such as polyacrylamide. The main uses of polyacrylamides are in water and wastewater treatment processes, pulp and paper processing, and mining and mineral processing. The announcement by the Swedish National Food Administration in April 2002 of the presence of acrylamide predominantly in heat-treated carbohydrate-rich foods sparked intensive investigations into acrylamide, encompassing the occurrence, chemistry, agricultural practices, and toxicology, in order to establish if there is a potential risk to human health from the presence of this contaminant in the human diet. The link of acrylamide in foods to the Maillard reaction and, in particular, to the amino acid asparagine has been a major step forward in elucidating the first feasible chemical route of formation during the preparation and processing of food. Other probably minor pathways have also been proposed, including acrolein and acrylic acid. This review addresses the analytical and mechanistic aspects of the acrylamide issue and summarizes the progress made to date by the European food industries in these key areas. Essentially, it presents experimental results generated under laboratory model conditions, as well as under actual food processing conditions covering different food categories, such as potatoes, biscuits, cereals, and coffee. Since acrylamide formation is closely linked to food composition, factors such as the presence of sugars and availability of free amino acids are also considered. Many new findings that contribute towards a better understanding of the formation and presence of acrylamide in foods are presented. Many national authorities across the world are assessing the dietary exposure of consumers to acrylamide, and scientific projects have commenced to gather new information about the toxicology of acrylamide. These are expected to provide new scientific knowledge that will help to clarify whether or not there is a risk to human health from the consumption of foods containing low amounts of acrylamide.

Analytical methods for the determination of acrylamide in food products: a review

In early 2002, the Swedish National Food Administration reported high acrylamide levels in heat-treated carbohydrate-rich foods. Consequently, intensive activity began examining the many different types of food, and thousands of analyses have been undertaken world wide. Measurement data have been published in many different types of media. Within this flood of publications, there are only a limited number of articles concerned with the technical aspects of the measurements. This review focuses on the state-of-the-art in the analysis of acrylamide in foodstuffs. It covers information on methods from peer-reviewed articles and other sources (e.g. a survey carried out among official and private laboratories of the Member States of the European Union). Alternative methods are presented and discussed alongside the more common measurement techniques for acrylamide in foodstuffs. Special attention is given to sample preparation. The greatest differences between the analytical methods was for acrylamide extraction and clean-up. The influence of different extraction techniques or extraction solvents/solvent mixtures on the measurement results has not yet been fully investigated. There is also a lack of understanding about the sample clean-up. Since both might have a large impact on the results of the analysis, this review should also be considered as a basis for further investigations.

Science Communication and the Swedish Acrylamide "Alarm"

On April 24, 2002 the Swedish National Food Administration along with a group of researchers at the University of Stockholm raised an alarm regarding potential health risks associated with eating fried and baked foods such as potatoes and bread. Scientists had found high levels of acrylamide (up to 500 times more acrylamide than that allowed in drinking water by the World Health Organisation), a substance widely believed to cause cancer, in cooked high starch foods. The outcomes of this "alarm" were immediate. In Sweden sales of chips fell by 30-50 percent over a 3-day period following the press conference, and share prices among several fried food manufacturers fell substantially, as stock analysts were fearful that consumption of fried foods would decrease significantly. Four days after the press conference, however, consumers began eating fried food as normal and a number of researchers and journalists in Sweden and elsewhere took the view that the alarm had been both exaggerated and ill placed. In this study, I evaluate the science communication process associated with the scare, based on a content analysis of a select group of Swedish broad sheets from just previous to the April 2002 press conference to the present time (December 2002). In addition, the study is based on interviews with the various Swedish regulators involved in the process itself (in particular at the Swedish National Food Administration) as well as with the scientists responsible for the study at Stockholm University and relevant journalists and politicians.

Reply: Dietary acrylamide and cancer risk: additional data on coffee

Sir, We appreciate the comments of Drs Hagmar and Tornqvist (2003) on our article assessing dietary acrylamide and cancer risk (Mucci et al, 2003). We take this opportunity to clarify some issues and to present data from additional analyses. We undertook the original investigation in light of claims by the Swedish National Food Administration that acrylamide in foods could have global impacts on cancer incidence rates. In spite of the potential limitations of the study design, our data are reassuring that acrylamide seems unlikely to be responsible for a major fraction of these cancers. As stated in our discussion, however, additional data are needed before a global assessment of any risks of dietary acrylamide can be undertaken in relation to other cancer sites and neurological diseases. The reliance on toxicological risk assessment models employed by Hagmar and Tornqvist may be questionable. Estimates of human cancer risk were extrapolated from animal models, given doses of acrylamide several fold higher than those to which humans are exposed (International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), 1994). We think that animal data must be generalized to humans with caution. This sentiment is reflected by IARC (2002) who considers an agent as definitely carcinogenic to humans when there is sufficient evidence from studies in humans (i.e. epidemiological evidence) and only ‘exceptionally’ in other situations. The authors present evidence from power analyses on the substantial sample size needed to detect an effect of acrylamide on human cancer risk. Notwithstanding the limitations of the risk assessment models, the authors determined an expected relative risk of 1.05 for the highest vs lowest dose. An effect estimate of this size is almost impossible to determine in any observational study. Indeed, not even a randomised clinical trial would have the power to detect this effect. The scientific methods to study such a small effect currently do not exist, and beg the question of how to best proceed to address the question of acrylamide and cancer. In addition, we must ask whether a relative risk of this size warranted the public health alarm that was generated when the findings of acrylamide in food were first announced.

Determination of Cholecalciferol (Vitamin D3) in Selected Foods by Liquid Chromatography: NMKL Collaborative Study

Results are presented from an NMKL (Nordic Committee on Food Analysis) collaborative study of a method for the determination of cholecalciferol (vitamin D3) in foods. The method is based on the addition of an internal standard (vitamin D2), followed by saponification and extraction with n-heptane. The fraction that contains vitamin D2/D3 is separated by preparative normal-phase liquid chromatography (LC), and the analytes are determined by reversed-phase LC with UV detection at 265 nm. The method was tested by 8 participating laboratories. In this study 6 different matrixes were analyzed for cholecalciferol content: milk, liquid infant formula (gruel), cooking oil, margarine, infant formula, and fish oil. The contents varied from 0.4 to 12 microg/100 g. Three matrixes (milk, gruel, and margarine) were fortified with vitamin D3. In the other matrixes, vitamin D3 was added at 3 different levels at the Swedish National Food Administration. The milk was analyzed as a blind duplicate, whereas the other matrixes were analyzed as split-level pairs. The recoveries from the samples with vitamin D3 added varied from 93 to 102%. The repeatability relative standard deviation (RSDr) values for accepted results varied between 2.2% (fish oil) and 7.4% (cooking oil), whereas the reproducibility relative standard deviation (RSD(R)) values varied between 6.8% (margarine) and 24% (cooking oil).