# Toxic Metals Migration from Plastic Food Contact Materials in Romania: A Health Risk Assessment
## 3 Results
### Heavy Metals Migration
[PERSON] (2024) [9] reported the highest concentration of migrated Fe (<800-6630 \(\upmu\)g/kg). In our study, its lowest migration rate was observed for PP packaging. All Fe migration values presented in Table 6 are below the imposed limit of 48,000 \(\upmu\)g/kg [11]. As can be seen from Table 6, the highest concentration of Pb was reported by [PERSON] (2024) [9], the obtained values (<20-570 \(\upmu\)g/kg) exceeding the limit set by Regulation 10 [11]. In contrast, [PERSON] et al. (2022) [45] found very low concentrations, particularly in PET samples, ranging from <0.011 to 0.18 \(\upmu\)g/kg. Concerning the migration of Cd, [PERSON] et al. (2022) [45] reported the lowest concentration in the food simulant for PET packages, measuring < 0.007 \(\upmu\)g/kg. Similarly, very low concentrations were observed for other materials, such as PS, PP, and PVC, ranging from <0.007 to 0.05 \(\upmu\)g/kg. For Cr migration, highest concentrations were obtained by [PERSON] (2024) [9] (<20 to 200 \(\upmu\)g/kg). According to Regulation 10 [11], this element must be undetectable in food simulants. In our study, we found reduced levels of Cr (<1.0 \(\upmu\)g/kg). Reduced concentrations were also obtained by [PERSON] et al. (2022) [44] (0.06-0.19 \(\upmu\)g/kg) and by [PERSON] et al. (2019) [39] in PP containers (0.15 \(\upmu\)g/kg) and PE films (0.84 \(\upmu\)g/kg). Regarding Sb, [PERSON] et al. (2022) [44] reported very low concentrations in PE samples (0.01 \(\upmu\)g/kg). [PERSON] (2024) [9] found the highest levels of migration, ranging from <20 to 120 \(\upmu\)g/kg, which are higher than the maximum imposed limit of 40 \(\upmu\)g/kg [11]. In our study, the highest concentrations were observed in the multilayer composite materials, ranging from <0.03 to 1.50 \(\upmu\)g/kg. The results of our research were consistent with those obtained by [PERSON] et al. (2022) [44], which ranged from 0.01 to 2.35 \(\upmu\)g/kg. Concerning Al migration, the highest concentrations were reported by [PERSON] (2024) [9] (<800-9630 \(\upmu\)g/kg), exceeding the EU regulatory limit of 1000 \(\upmu\)g/kg set by Regulation 10 [11] and its amendments. Low migration rates were reported by [PERSON] et al. (2019) [39] (49.30-135 \(\upmu\)g/kg), the highest concentration being obtained for PE film. As can be seen, excepting Pb, Ni, Cr, and Sb, which were detected by [PERSON] (2024) [9] in concentrations higher than the specific migration limits, all the other metals were detected in food simulants at concentrations below the imposed limits. The variations in metal release can be attributed to several factors, including the type of packaging material (impermeable, permeable, or porous), the physicochemical properties of the migrating substance, the type of food (high-fat foods tend to show higher migration levels) or food simulant, duration of contact (longer contact times increase migration), storage temperature (higher temperatures accelerate migration), pH levels (strongly acidic foods increase migration), and the packaging-to-food ratio (smaller packaging has a larger surface-to-volume ratio) [2; 8; 10; 16; 46]. Differences in manufacturing technology and pretreatment methods used in different studies also contribute to the variability in metal release [38].