EFSA updates assessment of opium alkaloids in poppy seeds
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has updated its risk assessment of opium alkaloids in poppy seeds, confirming many of its previous findings, including the amount of these substances that can be consumed safely.
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has updated its risk assessment of opium alkaloids in poppy seeds, confirming many of its previous findings, including the amount of these substances that can be consumed safely. While poppy seeds do not contain opium alkaloids, they can become contaminated with opium alkaloids because of pest damage and during harvest.
EFSA’s previous assessment, published in 2011, set a safe level—or acute reference dose (ARfD)—of 10 μg per kilogram (kg) of body weight based on the morphine content of poppy seeds. The European Commission asked EFSA to update the opinion considering new data on the alkaloid content of poppy seeds submitted to EFSA since 2011. The new opinion confirms the safe level of 10 μg/kg body weight but this time as a “group ARfD” that, in addition to morphine, also takes codeine content into account when calculating dietary exposure.
This is because the new data show that in some poppy seed samples on the European market, the concentration of codeine can be higher than that of morphine. The safe level may be exceeded by consumers of large amounts of seeds or of foods containing unprocessed poppy seeds. Due to the low amount of occurrence data on food products containing poppy seeds, EFSA’s Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain has highlighted uncertainties in exposure estimates. The Panel also notes that food processing steps, such as washing, heat treatment, and grinding, may reduce the alkaloid content in poppy seeds by 25% to 100%.
The assessment also considered data on other alkaloids present in poppy seeds—thebaine, oripavine, noscapine and papaverine. No full risk assessment could be carried out for these substances, but EFSA’s Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain indicated that dietary exposure to thebaine might pose a health risk. More data, particularly on the toxicity of thebaine, are needed to clarify this.