ESTIMATION OF DAILY INTAKE OF CHLOROFORM BY JAPANESE HOUSEWIVES

Duplicate portions of daily meals consumed by 21 housewives were collected for 3 consecutive days at Nagoya-city and Asuke-cho in Japan. The 24 h duplicate meals were analyzed for chloroform. Thirty grams of samples, 170 mL of water, 1 mL of phosphoric acid, and 0.5 g of ascorbic acid were mixed in a distillation flask which was heated under nitrogen gas flow. The purged chloroform was trapped in n-pentane cooled at 0° C. The pentane solution was analyzed to by electron capture gas chromatography. Confirmation of chloroform was carried out by GC-MS. The concentration of chloroform in each of the 24-h duplicate meals were in the range of 1.7 to 45.8 ppb and the average concentration was 13.7± 9.6 ppb. Daily dietary intake of chloroform by housewives were in the range of 7.5 to 51.9 μg and the mean intake was 26.4 ± 11.8 μg.