Toxicity of Melamine: The Public Health Concern

Abstract

Melamine contamination in food has resulted in sickness and deaths of human infants, pets, and farm animals in the past decade. The majority of the victims suffered from acute kidney injury, nephrolithiasis, and urolithiasis. Since then, animal studies have revealed the possible target organs of the melamine toxicity and the extent of the adverse effects of the contaminant. State-of-the-art analytical methods have been developed to achieve the “zero tolerance” aim for such economically motivated adulteration. These studies provide in-depth understanding of the melamine toxicity and promising analytical methods, which can help us safeguard our dairy food source.

Keywords:

• Melamine
• adulteration
• toxicology
• toxicokinetics
• analytical
• food safety
• public health

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This study was supported by a funding on Studies Related to Melamine Incident from Food and Health Bureau, Hong Kong Special Administration Region (MI-BS-06).