Links Found Between Arsenic Levels And Infants Eating Rice-Based Cereals

Babies eat a lot of rice as their first food, but scientists now find a lot of "inorganic" arsenic concentrations in their urine compared to the urine of kids who do not eat rice.

A team of scientists examined diet information and urine samples from 759 infants born to mothers that were part of the New Hampshire Birth Cohort Study between 2011 and 2014. Through phone interviews every four months until each turned 1, the team found out about their dietary patterns in the previous weeks.

The study showed that infants consuming baby rice cereal showed the highest levels of arsenic concentrations in their urine. They were thrice the levels seen in babies with no rice in their diet. Babies who ate rice-based snacks had almost double the arsenic levels than other babies that did not consume the cereal.

"The arsenic in their urine increased with the number of servings of rice or rice-containing food," said Margaret Karagas, chair of epidemiology at Dartmouth University's Geisel School of Medicine and lead author of the study.

Health experts are worried by the findings.

"It certainly sounds concerning," said  Ruth Milanaik, director of the neonatal neurodevelopmental follow-up program at Cohen Children's Medical Center, who was not involved in the research. "It certainly requires more study."

However, Milanaik said that some factors such as arsenic in apple juice or drinking water have not been taken into account.

Arsenic, a known carcinogen, can enhance the risk of heart disease, and also, endanger the immune system and intellectual development in early life. While inorganic arsenic is found frequently in infant plant-based foods such as apple juice, still, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced that limits would be put on arsenic' levels in rice cereals for infants.

"Even though in this country we've outlawed it, we used it for so long that it's leached into our soil and really becomes part of our vegetation," Milanaik said.

The findings were published on April 25, 2016, issue of JAMA Pediatrics.