Contaminants: a dark side of food supplements?

Abstract

Food supplements (FS) are often consumed as one of the strategies to fight ageing-associated pathologies, especially in the case of oxidative stress-related diseases. Despite the popularity of FS, some concerns about their quality and safety have been raised, especially regarding the presence of contaminants. This paper reviews and discusses the occurrence of contaminants in marketed samples of FS in the last two decades, considering both scientific literature and notifications registered on RASFF portal. The most relevant classes of contaminants were included namely metals, toxins, pesticides, dioxins and PCBs, as well as pharmacologically active ingredients. Variable amounts of contaminants were reported in a significant number of commercially available FS. Although the presence of contaminants does not necessarily mean that their levels exceed the regulatory limits or that the FS intake constitutes a risk to human health, it alerts for the need to further monitor FS safety. The evaluation of the risk associated to the consumption of FS, especially in the elderly population, is particularly challenging due to the frequent exposure to multiple toxicants and to different exposure sources, as well as due to possible pre-existing diseases and respective therapeutics. Therefore, improved quality control procedures and monitoring programs should be pursued in order to avoid undesirable products and assure the safety of FS.

Keywords:

• Chemical contaminants
• food supplements
• oxidative-stress-related diseases

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This article is based upon work from COST Action NutRedOx-CA16112 supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology). B. V. also acknowledges the COST Action NutRedOx, CA16112 for her STSM Grant. The authors acknowledge the support from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT, Portugal), through funding UID/DTP/04567/2019 to CBIOS and UID/DTP/04138/2019 to iMed.ULisboa, as well as from the Ministarstvo Prosvete, Nauke i Tehnolo_skog Razvoja of the Republic of Serbia, through the project III46009.