# mycotoxins ( Mould) in my coffee?



## Catlady101 (Sep 26, 2020)

This is purely for my education - it is not in any way a scientific thing for anyone to worry about as far as I know I am just keen to find out....

I thought I would ask the clever coffee people here as I have searched the blessed internet for the last couple of weeks, founds lots of stories and webpages talking about this but no actual scientific fact or detail.

So - mould free coffee?

Sold as not having any mould and therefore not having any dangerous mycotoxins ( toxins produced by certain types of mould that are toxic to people)

I have read that -

* arabica has less than robusta

* washed coffee has less than dry processed coffee

* higher elevations for growing coffeee has less than lower elevations of coffee

* single origin has less than a blend

* caffeinated has less than decaf ( stated reason being that caffeine inhibits mould growth)

I would like to know -

what is the % mycotoxin /ml of brewed coffee

what % micotoxins /ml of brewed coffee will do me harm

None of the above "facts" from the internet are facts - there is no evidence given on any of the sites, I have found no published papers and there are no references given in the statements made by the bloggers, the roasters, or the retailers discussing this topic which makes me think perhaps this is not actually an issue.

I do know that the toxins from moulds are bad for humans (mycotoxins) but I am none the wiser as to how much is bad for me in a cup of coffee as the research I have found on mycotoxins ( and there is plenty) refers to specific mycotoxins, and most are not food / bervage related - one was to do with wine making, one to do with grains torage and processeing and H&S equipment for people in the vacinity of grain milling and processing, but I could not find one for coffee - not to sare there are none, but I am just too daft to find any so help, links, advice sought and welcomed.

Before anyone panics, this is for my own personal education, it is not in any way given as a fact or that someone needs to worry about, which I think is shown by there being no big news reports and that scientific data is not easily available, and if you think about it, the fact that people have been drinking coffee for a long time and not dropping like flies and none of the information available refers to anything new - i.e. even those sites that say this is a thing refer to the standard processes that have being used for at least decades - I am just interested and keen to learn more, and too daft to find the answers myself.


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## _HH_ (Oct 10, 2018)

This is a difficult one to answer. Hopefully someone who has a better understanding of the subject than me will chip in.

The two questions you are asking are, by definition, almost impossible to answer. Asking 'what percentage of mycotoxin is present per ml of coffee' is akin to asking 'how much bacteria is on a sausage'.

If we consider the bacteria/sausage question, we can see this is likely to vary on the type, brand and quality of sausage, as well as the processing techniques used to make, package, store and cook the sausage in question. Has it just been cooked? Was it left to cool at ambient temperatures or flash cooled? How much moisture is in/on the sausage? Similarly this could apply to coffee, with amounts of mycotoxins conceivably varying by varietal, processing facility and technique used, how the coffee is stored, packaged, roasted and brewed.

If we think about the second question, 'what percentage of mycotoxin per ml will be bad for me', in a very simplistic way, we can again consider this from the viewpoint of asking 'how much bacterial load on my food will be bad for me'. I am not suggesting that the pathological processes triggered by exposure to, for example, salmonella, and a specific form of mycotoxin such as ochratoxin (the type more commonly linked with coffee) are the same as I don't know enough about the subject to be able to confirm whether this is the case, just that it makes my comparison more straightforward.

When considering the effect of exposure to a specific bacterial strain, the outcome depends greatly on the type of strain one is exposed to, the amount of exposure, the virulence of the strain itself as well as the health and immune function of the exposed individual. You can see therefore that it's very hard to quantify your questions with specific figures, which I appreciate is frustrating.

If you wanted to look into this further and don't have access to Athens or similar portal for academic papers, google scholar or pubmed will usually have abstracts of submitted papers available. This doesn't allow you to critique the validity of the drawn conclusions however, so I would caution taking the abstract's conclusion as gospel. There is a huge amount of very flawed research out there and questionable journals that publish them. I would try and stick to reputable journals if you can - with a caveat that even those can be fallible. You only have to consider the 1998 Wakefield paper published (it has now been fully retracted and is no longer considered published evidence) in The Lancet as evidence of this, and the damage this fraudulent paper caused.


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## DavecUK (Aug 6, 2013)

You are in far more danger from a machines water tank not being sanitised each week!


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## John Yossarian (Feb 2, 2016)

It is a very difficult thing to answer. Someone who is a microbiologist needs to address it and yet I am not sure such data exist, unless you work for Lavazza (they must have this information given the scale of their business) but I doubt they would willingly shared it.

A question I would be more interested in answering would be, are the mycotoxins thermally stable when treated during roasting and later during brewing. The chances are they are not and as such after roasting very little (if any) is left so the brewing would be mycotoxins free.

It is not an easy experiment to perform, although I am sure it would make a good topic for a MSc (or even a PhD) Thesis. Hypothetically, "What fungi on green coffee beans generate mycotoxins and are those potential harm for human health."

I personally have no concerns of the kind.

Hopefully someone in the know would chip in.


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## whittakerturbeville (12 mo ago)

I didn't understand one point a little. What does it mean "caffeine contains less caffeine than decaffeinated coffee".


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## MWJB (Feb 28, 2012)

whittakerturbeville said:


> I didn't understand one point a little. What does it mean "caffeine contains less caffeine than decaffeinated coffee".


 Where is this quote from?


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## whittakerturbeville (12 mo ago)

MWJB said:


> Where is this quote from?


 To be honest, I don't remember myself, but I read it on one site. This is not a literal quote, this is how I remember it


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## whittakerturbeville (12 mo ago)

whittakerturbeville said:


> I didn't understand one point a little. What does it mean "caffeine contains less caffeine than decaffeinated coffee".


 This sentence sounds like some nonsense. I also noticed how mold appears in the cafe after some storage time, but I didn't attach any importance to this. If you're really concerned about this fact, because coffee stocks have time to acquire mold, you can do a food safety test to determine which trace elements spoil the quality of coffee and cause fungus. I've never had mold in a cafe because I use French press capsules, so I can't speak for myself.


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## MWJB (Feb 28, 2012)

whittakerturbeville said:


> This sentence sounds like some nonsense. I also noticed how mold appears in the cafe after some storage time, but I didn't attach any importance to this. If you're really concerned about this fact, because coffee stocks have time to acquire mold, you can do a food safety test to determine which trace elements spoil the quality of coffee and cause fungus. I've never had mold in a cafe because I use French press capsules, so I can't speak for myself.


 You can quite safely ruin the quality of coffee 

What are French press capsules?


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