Wine metallomics

I suppose everybody who follows this blog is acquainted with the theory linking the lead posoning and decline of Roman Empire. But sure that was a long time ago? Bad news, everybody: the wine we drink now still has the metals we really needn’t. According to this paper,

The THQ <target hazard quotient> values were determined as ranges from previously reported ranges of metal ion concentrations and were frequently concerningly high. Apart from the wines selected from Italy, Brazil and Argentina, all other wines exhibited THQ values significantly greater than one indicating levels of risk. The levels of vanadium, copper and manganese had the highest impact on THQ measures. Typical potential maximum THQ values ranged from 50 to 200 with Hungarian and Slovakian wines reaching 300. THQ values for a sample of red and white wines were high for both having values ranging from 30 to 80 for females based on a 250 mL glass per day.

Well, I’ll stick to Italian (post-Roman) wine then.