Presence of Heavy Metals in Vegetables Collected from Jashore, Bangladesh: Human Health Risk Assessment

This research was carried out to estimate the concentrations of heavy metals (Fe, Mn, Cu, Zn, Pb and Cd) and to assess the human health risk. Estimated Daily Intake (EDI), Target Hazard Quotient (THQ), Hazard Index (HI) and Target Cancer Risk (TCR) were measured and the carcinogenic and non-carcinogenic health risks were calculated. The concentrations of Mn, Fe, Cu and Zn except Cd and Pb were below the permission limit proposed by the joint FAO/WHO. Transfer factor of heavy metals from soil to vegetables was calculated and the decreasing order was Cu (0.786) > Cd (0.759) > Zn (0.569) > Pb (0.432) > Mn (0.167) > Fe (0.050). Assessment of non-carcinogenic health hazards by THQ indicated no concern for individual Mn, Fe, Cu and Zn except Cd and Pb. But the combined impact of all metals (HI = 8.64775) was very high than the acceptable limit of 1.0 for all vegetables. So, the consumption of these vegetables were the prime concern for non-carcinogenic health effects and all metals together may affect the human health as revealed by HI. The probability of developing cancer from the consumption of studied vegetable was greater than USEPA threshold risk limit (>10–5) for Mn (2.8E–3), Pb (1.17E–4) and Cu (9.5E–4); (> 10–3) for Zn (2.15E–2) and Fe (1.45E–1). These values indicated moderate cancer risk for Mn, Cu and Pb, high cancer risk for Fe and Zn whereas Cd showed low cancer risk from this study area.