Determinants of aflatoxin exposures in Kenyan School-aged children

ABSTRACT

Aflatoxins are naturally occurring food toxins known to contaminate cereals with a carry-over effect in milk and meat products from farm animals raised on contaminated feed. In children, continuous consumption of aflatoxin-contaminated food is linked to immune suppression, vaccine interference and growth faltering while in adult populations, carcinogenesis in the liver has been established. We evaluate the main determinants of aflatoxin exposures among children recruited from primary schools in Makueni and Siaya Counties. A five-part questionnaire was administered to collect information from randomly selected participants. AflatoxinB₁-lysine adducts in children’s sera and total aflatoxins in food samples were analyzed by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography with Fluorescence detection. Using Chi-squared tests and Kruskal–Wallis tests, children from low-income households had the highest aflatoxin exposure, p-value = 0.0029. Smaller family size, greater food diversity, and good farming practices were associated with low aflatoxin exposures p < 0.001. Individual households living under severe levels of poverty were evidently exposed to higher levels of aflatoxins.

KEYWORDS:

• Aflatoxins
• children
• determinants
• socio-economic factors

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to the Kenya county governments and communities in Siaya and Makueni counties for supporting this study. We would also like to thank all participating schools, helpful administrative personnel, cooperative mothers and all children who assented to study procedures. Most importantly, we are grateful to research assistants and phlebotomists both in Makueni and Siaya Counties without whom this work may have not been possible.

Disclosure of interest

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by small grants from The university of Georgia to Ruth Nabwire Wangia-Dixon, namely, the Interdisciplinary and Innovative Research Grant and the Tipton Golias Travel award. The funding source did not play any role in the conceptualization and execution of this research project.