Assessment Of The Nitrite, Nitrate And Nitrosamine Concentration Present In Firewood Smoked Fish From Three Major Markets In Umuahia, Abia State:- Mbah Ifeanyichukwu

ABSTRACT xi The analyses of the nitrite, nitrate and nitrosamine contents of smoked fish from three major markets in Umuahia, Abia State was investigated in this study. Samples of smoked fish were purchased at random from local market sellers at Isi gate, Ori ugba and Ubani markets in Umuahia respectively. The fish samples were prepared for use by mashing and the reagents used were also prepared using standard methods. Determination of nitrite, nitrate and nitrosamine concentrations were done using spectrophotometric methods respectively. The result showed that the nitrite concentration of smoked fish from Ubani market (0.96±0.04) decreased significantly (p<0.05) when compared to the concentration offish samples from Isi-gate (1.13± 0.01) and Oriugba markets (1.15 ± 0.02) respectively. The higher levels of nitrite in the fish samples from Isigate and Ori-ugba markets suggested toxicity in consumers which may consequently lead to the development of carcinogenic disease conditions. There were no significant (p<0.05) differences in the nitrate and nitrosamine concentration ofsmoked fishes from the different sources and were all within the normal range (3.7mg/kg for nitrate, Img/kg for nitrosamine) as approved by the WHO.