Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB) monitoring on food of animal origin

Recently, a large amount of polychlorinated biphenyls and dioxins was found in a wide range of animal feeds acid food of animal origin, made in Belgiu m (1999). This incident represents a serious problem for public health. For this rea;son the European Union has established a program to monitoring PC Bs levels in various food products of animal origin, in order to evaluate c ontamination levels and potential human health hazards from consumption. In the present paper the A.A, report the results of PCBs content determinat ion in food and animal tissues collected in southern Italy. The quantitation of PCBs was made from the sum of seven toxic congeners, ob tained by high resolution gas chromatography with an electron capture detec tor. Confirmatory analysis was performed by gas chromatography-mass spectro metry. The results obtained confirm the presence of PCB residues in various tissue s but in only a asample the analyses yield a result above the value establi shed by the European Union for PCBs levels in food of animal origin produce d in Belgium.