Resumo

VARGAS VELASQUEZ, Claudia¹; LOPEZ REINOSO, Ana Rosa²  e  FLORES ARTUNDUAGA, Luisa María Brisna². Evaluation nitrates/nitrites and sodium chloride concentration in processedmeats sold in the capital of Tarija. Rev. Vent. Cient. [online]. 2014, vol.1, n.7, pp. 1-8. ISSN 2305-6010.

Processed meats are meat producís prepared with meat, blood or a mixture of both, which besides containing essences, herbs, they also contain additives that are substances that are not normally consumed as food substances, these are added for technological or organoleptic purposes. To know the composition of foods, the additives, the degradation mechanisms, as well as the dangers to public health when eating poorly adapted or more stabilized foods are important factors that will contribute to safeguard the consumers' health, as well as to control the amount of used additives such as nitrates, nitrites and sodium chloride, which is a regular practice although controversial. These are to be found in harmless concentrations and as indicated by international regulations as well as the national ones to preserve the consumers' health when including these kinds of producís ¡n their daily diet. The objective of this research was to make a physicochemical evaluation of sodium nitrite levéis using the colorimeter spectro-photometric and sodium chloride method based on the Mohr volumetric method ¡n processed meats sold ¡n the major selling áreas ¡n the city center of Tanja ¡n the year2012. This is a descriptive, prospective and cross-sectional research. The research design is not experimental; having considered 3 selling stands in the city center, elected under the decisional criterion of the researcher for being these the most retailing places of the city. 2 ham samples, 2 cold processed meat samples, 2 sausage samples were taken, making all together 18 tested samples. The research results reported that from all the analyzed samples 11% present nitttrite valúes above the valúes permitted by the IBNORCA Bolivian Regulation and 6% of them presented high valúes of sodium chloride. The remaining percentage of samples, which is the largest, for both physical-chemical parameters represent samples that are cióse to and below the máximum valúes allowed by the Bolivian Regulation. As a conclusión, processed meats sold in the Central área in the city of Tarija are harmless to the health of adult consumers, however it should be noted that consumption should be modérate and not excessive, mainly to avoid health complications such as arterial hypertension, metahemoglobinemia, cáncer among others, besides this, children and pregnant women are to avoid over-consumption

Palavras-chave : Nitratos; nitritos; cloruro de sodio; embutidos.