Toward the definition of a criterion to suspect thiouracil administration in animal husbandry

Bruno Le Bizec , Emmanuelle Bichon , Yoann Deceuninck , Stéphanie Prévost , Fabrice Monteau , Jean-Philippe Antignac , Gaud Dervilly-Pinel (1)

1 LABERCA - Laboratoire d'étude des Résidus et Contaminants dans les Aliments

Thyreostats are growth promoters banned in Europe since 1981. The identification of thiouracil (TU) in animal biological matrices is however not anymore systematically interpreted as the consequence of an illegal administration. Indeed, some experimental results pointed out a causality link between cruciferous-based diet and the presence of TU in urine of bovines. The present study aims at investigating, on a large scale (n > 1300), the natural occurrence of thiouracil in urine samples collected in different animal species. TU was identified in main breeding animal species: bovine, porcine and ovine. The natural distribution of TU allowed proposing threshold values to differentiate compliant from suspect urine samples. Suggested values are 5.7 µg.L-1 and 9.1 µg.L-1 in male adult bovine (6-24 months), 3.1 µg.L-1 and 8.1 µg.L-1 in female adult bovine (6-24 months), 7.3 µg.L-1 and 17.7 µg.L-1 in calves (< 6 months), 3.9 µg.L-1 and 8.8 µg.L-1 in female bovine (> 24 months), 2.9 µg.L-1 and 4.1 µg.L-1 in porcine, at 95% and 99% confidence level respectively.

Mots clés: Life Sciences

Bruno Le Bizec, Emmanuelle Bichon, Yoann Deceuninck, Stéphanie Prévost, Fabrice Monteau, et al.. Toward the definition of a criterion to suspect thiouracil administration in animal husbandry. Food Additives and Contaminants, 2011, ⟨10.1080/19440049.2011.565483⟩. ⟨hal-00694614⟩