Food and Water Uptake

This component of the mitigation framework regards the risk of uptake of geogenic contaminants (e.g. As, F) via food and beverages. This is important to consider, as exposure to the contaminant and resulting health effects might not only arise because of the consumption of contaminated drinking water.

Research question: how high is the uptake of the substance of concern for humans in a certain area?

This question can be addressed by undertaking an uptake analysis using the well-known method of Material Flow Analysis (MFA)

Uptake Analysis

1. Analysis of possible ways of uptake: Which are the relevant pathways of consumption, for example via food, beverages, breathing, medicine, cosmetics etc. ?

2. Assessment of the pathways: Determining the amount of substance consumed via each pathway.

3. Interpreting the results: comparing the total uptake with reference values.

Such an uptake analysis can answer the following crucial questions:

• How high is the uptake per person and day via food and beverages?
• Which are the most important pathways concerning uptake via food and beverages?
• Which uptake pathways have to be reduced in order to be below required reference values (e.g. the WHO guideline)
  
  

Uptake analysis includes the close evaluation of ingredients, the concentrations of the concerned substance (in this case fluoride in flour, water, vegetables etc. used for cooking in Ethiopia)  and the food production process

This analysis is crucial for a careful selection of possible treatment options. For instance, it can be estimated what the effect of water treatment on the overall uptake would be. In particular, what would be the effects on fluoride uptake if drinking and cooking water was treated?