Tag Archives: food additives

May 4, 2015 · 3:13 am

Have you gotten your fresh air and sunshine medicine today?

England had several early advocates of the curative value of sun and fresh air. Physician John Lettsom (1744-1815) prescribed sea air and sunshine for children who were suffering from tuberculosis (TB). In 1840, surgeon George Bodington noted that those who worked in the open air—farmers, plowmen, shepherds—were generally free of TB, while those who spent much of their time indoors seemed more susceptible to it.

I love this kind of information. Sunshine and fresh air are good for us. Who’da thunk it?

I think we are all hard-wired to know simple, wonderful facts like this, but the information gets lost in the myriad facts of the mental mayhem that makes up modern living. Now we have science backing up our own intuition.

I know I am going to enjoy riding my bike out in the sun even more now.

Tony

Could Common Food Additives Be Causing Serious Health Problems?

This is really depressing. We already eat too much and exercise too little which creates our weight problems. The last thing we need is something bad in what we think of as our healthy foods, too. The battle never ends.

Tony

Our Better Health

New research suggests they do.

By Katie Levans / EcoWatch March 4, 2015

Emulsifiers approved for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration are commonly added to processed foods to improve texture, increase shelf life and prevent oils and fats from separating. You’ll see them listed on ingredient labels as polysorbate 80, lecithin, carrageenan, polyglycerols, xanthan and other gums in everything from bread and cookies to salad dressings, ice cream, non-dairy milks and more. Emulsifiers are also used to reduce or remove trans fats and gluten from low-fat, dairy-free and gluten-free items marketed as “health” foods and can appear in organic and non-GMO labeled foods as well.

Can Carrageenan in Some Soy Milk Cause Cancer?

As pervasive as they are in packaged foods,
could emulsifiers be causing health concerns?

A recent study concludes that dietary emulsifiers promote inflammatory diseases in mice by interfering with beneficial microbiota in the gut. According to researchers, dietary emulsifiers disrupt the mucus…

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Mc Donald’s Mc Rib Chemical Additives Rated by CSPI

“Few fast-food items have achieved the cultural prominence of the McRib. Object of satire, conspiracy theory, and fevered online speculation, the McRib typically appears on McDonald’s menus with great fanfare only to vanish, fleetingly, some time later,” according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI).

“As Ian Bogost wrote in The Atlantic, we experience the McRib as (quasi-)foodstuff, as marketing campaign, as cult object, as Internet meme, but those experiences don’t sufficiently explain it.

“Indeed.

“To better explain the McRib, the Center for Science in the Public Interest has taken a closer look at a few of its chemical ingredients. There’s more to the McRib, it turns out, than bun, pork, sauce, pickles and onions.

“McRib Pork Patty: BHA, propyl gallate, and citric acid are used as preservatives in the patty. While citric acid is safe, CSPI recommends that consumers avoid BHA (butylated hydroxyanisole) and propyl gallate. The Food and Drug Administration permits the use of BHA in food, even though its parent agency, the Department of Health and Human Services, says that BHA is “reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen.” It is often used with propyl gallate to prevent fats and oils from spoiling. CSPI says that propyl gallate may be an endocrine disruptor and needs to be better studied.

“McRib Sauce: After water, the main ingredient in the sauce is high-fructose corn syrup. It’s not true that HFCS is worse than regular sugar, but CSPI recommends everyone cut back on both. Xanthan gum, which is secreted by bacteria, is safe, at least in this application. (Used in a product called SimplyThick, it has caused problems in infants.) Sodium benzoate appears to be safe, though it causes allergic reactions in sensitive individuals. It is unclear exactly which of several caramel color varieties is used in McRib Sauce, but when it is produced with ammonia, carcinogenic contaminants form. That’s been a problem in caramel-colored soft drinks, but regardless of how the caramel coloring in McRib Sauce was produced, the amount one would consume is small and not a problem. Good for McDonald’s for using beet powder to color the sauce instead of Red 3 (a carcinogen) or Red 40 (one of several dyes which in Europe must be labeled as having “an adverse effect on activity and attention in children”). Continue reading →