Mycotoxins’ Toxicities - from Consumer Health Safety Concerns, to Mitigation/Treatment Strategies: A Perspective Review

Abstract

Mycotoxins contaminating agricultural commodities like animal, and plant products result in human health complications, some are hidden, visible, chronic, and or acute, and others long-term. To understand the current status, published relevant reviews conducted between 2020-2021 about mycotoxins toxicities involving animals, food, and human showed the need for additional literature synthesis. This would help better the understanding of consumers of animal and plant food products about the importance of mycotoxins toxicities, and such knowledge should extend to other stakeholders within the food supply chain. In this perspective review, we discussed the mycotoxins’ toxicities - from consumer health safety concerns, to mitigation/treatment strategies, drawing from: (a) Toxicology, consumer health safety concerns, and action mechanisms of mycotoxins; (b)  Toxic effects of combined mycotoxins exposure; (c) Major mycotoxin effects on infants and children; (d) Mycotoxin exposures’ complications/risks at various stages of human life; (e) Consumer health implications of mycotoxin exposure; as well as (f) Mycotoxin toxicities mitigation/removal strategies. Indeed, concerted efforts to solve the mycotoxins toxicities are warranted, which should help to deduce more lasting and sustainable ways of preventing fungal invasion and mycotoxins production in the food and feed value chain.