Pyrrolizidine alkaloids in floral honeys of tropical Ghana and health risk assessment

Abstract

There is a vast amount of information about the nutritional and medicinal properties of honey as a result of its numerous benefits. However, honeys have been found to be contaminated with hepatotoxic and carcinogenic pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) on account of bees foraging on PA-containing plants. This study deals with the analysis of PAs in tropical honeys emanating from different agro-ecological zones of Ghana in order to assess its potential health risk. PAs of 48 honey samples were analysed using high-performance liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-ESI-MS/MS). The results show that a total of 85% of the honeys from various agro-ecological zones were PA positive including all honeys from supermarkets. The highest concentration of PAs was 2639 μg kg, while the average PA concentration of the samples was 283 μg kg. The study also found Chromolaena odorata pollens in majority of the honeys, thus indicating the plant as major source of PA contamination of honeys in the tropical regions.

Metabolic Toxification of 1,2-Unsaturated Pyrrolizidine Alkaloids Causes Human Hepatic Sinusoidal Obstruction Syndrome: The Update

“…Most bee products, such as honey, bee pollen, propolis, and royal jelly, are consumed by humans in a belief in their health benefits, although evidence-based data in support of such beneficial properties are limited [ 26 , 27 ]. Better studied is the potential contamination of bee products with PAs; for example, by bees collecting material from flowering plants that contain PAs [ 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 ]. However, of theoretical interest only are these abundant reports, because they focus primarily on the amount of PAs in bee products rather than on the issue of whether or not even high amounts of PAs are potentially dangerous to consumers, e.g., causing liver injury in the form of HSOS.…”

A botanical census on pyrrolizidine alkaloid-producing species in Brazilian herbaria: data set for a potential health risk indication

“…The latter is considered to be the most susceptible food substrate to PA contamination, with apicultural products being the most likely source for exposure to PA contamination (Bandini & Spisso 2017). Accurate analyses of honey produced by bees that fed on Echium, Eupatorium and Senecio species (Crews et al 1997;Kast et al 2018) or more diversified sources -including pollens -have indicated the presence of PAs in most of the investigated samples (Dubecke et al 2011;Valese et al 2016;Letsyo et al 2017).…”

Incidence of Pyrrolizidine Alkaloids in Herbal Medicines from German Retail Markets: Risk Assessments and Implications to Consumers

“…Pyrrolizidine alkaloids are inherent natural toxins found in a wide variety of plant species (about 3% of all flowering plants), mostly of the families Boraginaceae (many plants), Asteraceae (tribes Senecioneae and Eupotorieae), Orchidaceae (nine genera), and Fabaceae (mainly the genus Crotalaria ) (Ober & Hartmann, ). However, the safety of herbal preparations containing these alkaloids has recently been called into question as a result of significant liver damage to human (Australia New Zealand Food Authority, ) who consume PA‐containing HMs (Dharmananda, ; Letsyo, Jerz, Winterhalter, & Beuerle, ; Röder, ), herbal tea preparations (Bundesinstitut für Risikobewertung (BfR), ; Mädge et al ., ), traditional Chinese medicinal plants (Zhou, Ouedraogo, Qu, & Duez, ), and honeys (Dübecke, Beckh, & Lüllmann, ; Kempf et al ., ; Letsyo, Jerz, Winterhalter, Dübecke et al, ). Therefore, this study aims to determine the PA contents of commercially available HMs sold in German retail outlets and pharmacies together with the attempt to identify those plant preparations/ingredients that are prone to PA contamination.…”