Aluminum is the third most abundant element in the earth’s crust and is widely used by humans including aluminum kitchen utensils and food packages. The Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA) revised the provisional tolerable weekly intake (PTWI) for aluminum to 2 mg/kg body weight/week in 2011. The estimated range of mean dietary aluminum intake was 2-19 mg/person/day based on the literature. Aluminum kitchen utensils and food packages have the possibility to release aluminum into foods during cooking or storage, though the estimated aluminum intakes from them were reported very few. Therefore, Japanese aluminum intake was estimated based on our test results and Japanese food consumption data. The estimated aluminum intake from aluminum kitchen utensils and food packages was the highest for an adult per person, however, it was the highest for a child based on body weight. They ranged from 0.277-0.570 mg/person/day (0.06-0.12 mg/kg bw/week) on average and 0.677-1.333 mg/person/day (0.15-0.29 mg/kg bw/week) at a maximum. All of these results were sufficiently lower than the PTWI.
