Unsafe Food in the USA

[mwfanelli]

Considering all the poisoned food being reported around the country over the last few months, now extended to a huge portion of the dog food industry, how safe is the USA food supply? Has polluted water (blamed for the spinach poisoning), overuse of dangerous chemicals, and just outright carelessness of growers and packers lead to the birth of a USA food crisis? How much do you trust the food you consume?

[adina]

I'm fairly confident on our food. Everything is cooked to the proper temps, washed before eaten, and we eat a lot of organic (drives dh crazy pricewise).

Visit your local farmers markets people! My girls love going to those. Not only to choose what they want fresh, but to see all sorts of things we haven't tried yet.

We also love Whole Foods. Not just for shopping, but the staff at our local(ish) one is amazing. I was shopping with my 6 yr old, we always go past the seafood counter. Well, they had ocotopuses. She was soo impressed. The seafood guy gave her a pair of plastic gloves, got the octopus out, showed her the different parts, let her touch it, explained to her how you'd eat it. Are they going to do that at Pick-n-Save? Probably not.

[another view]

I love the farmer's markets - the big one in Madison WI should be starting up outdoors again in about a month.

The reason that food safety is in the news is because food is produced on such a mass scale. A problem at one plant can affect the entire country, as we saw with peanut butter. The same thing could happen with smaller producers of course, but it wouldn't be national news.

I don't know how true this is, but I only buy organic produce if it's grown in the USA. Other countries have different laws (or lack of) regarding the type of fertilizers that are used...

[adina]

I love the farmer's markets - the big one in Madison WI should be starting up outdoors again in about a month.

I don't know how true this is, but I only buy organic produce if it's grown in the USA. Other countries have different laws (or lack of) regarding the type of fertilizers that are used...

That's 100% true. Sure, not all of them, but yes, other countries have less strict laws about that. I was just at the dr to get my shots (we're going on a cruise) and she went on and on about the difference in standards.

We love the Madison farmer's market. I'm going to be getting up early once a month and taking my girls. Otherwise we content ourselves with the smaller local ones.

[another view]

other countries have less strict laws about that...

...thinking especially of Mexico, a lot of our produce (and some organic) comes from there... I'm not a germophobe or anything - I just try not to go looking for problems.

And I think that being more "connected" to the supply of food is going to be a better bet, such as buying directly from the producer at the farmer's market. You can ask them questions about how they do things and get knowledgeable answers. I always do that, but they're usually thrilled to talk about what they're selling - to me that says they care about what they're doing. There's an excellent one in St. Paul MN too, but most of the time I go to one of the local markets.

[walterick]

Well, I could probably argue the point that most of our food has been poison in one sense or another for the last 100 years or so (ever since they invented inorganic food) but I'll deal with the broader notion we're discussing here. I don't trust much of what comes out of a corporation whose bottom line is to produce capital. Yet, I don't feel I have much of a choice in the matter. When the food poisoning problem begins to affect rich folks or the people who vote, we'll start seeing "radical food industry reform." Until then, I eat organic when I can afford it (prices have come way down) and "natural" food when I can because, well, that's what we're supposed to be doing anyway.

[mwfanelli]

I'm fairly confident on our food. Everything is cooked to the proper temps, washed before eaten, and we eat a lot of organic (drives dh crazy pricewise).

The spinach problem could not be washed away by any means. The bacteria was in the polluted water used on the plants, it was absorbed by the spinach, not just spread on top. Also, I forget where, but there was a report on organic foods showing that a lot of it was worse off than the mass-produced stuff.

It used to be a joke that farmers sell the crap they'd never eat to the public, saving the good stuff (and much more expensive to produce) for their own families.

[drg]

You can always consider gardening. Then you know for sure what has and has not been done to the produce.

Oh, and I don't eat food that isn't organic Plastic just is not as tasty without red dye Number 5.

[another view]

I eat organic when I can afford it (prices have come way down)

There's a correlation there... I don't mind the fact that organic food is "trendy" - just look at all the SUV's in the Whole Foods parking lot (and Whole Foods, for that matter). Some of it just tastes better too. Carrots, for instance - really!

Speaking of peanut butter, I've heard that we (USA) get a lot of peanuts from India where spraying DDT is a legal and accepted practice. Can't remember where I came across that info but I remember it being what I thought was a reliable source. DDT was banned here in the 70's partly after coming to everyone's attention after the book Silent Spring (which is still on my list of books to read).

[adina]

The spinach problem could not be washed away by any means. The bacteria was in the polluted water used on the plants, it was absorbed by the spinach, not just spread on top. Also, I forget where, but there was a report on organic foods showing that a lot of it was worse off than the mass-produced stuff.

It used to be a joke that farmers sell the crap they'd never eat to the public, saving the good stuff (and much more expensive to produce) for their own families.

That's why I don't eat spinich. At all, ever. Ick.

We garden as well. Our neighbor keeps offering to come over and spray our garden so we don't have so many weeds, but my kids are in there eating things right off the plant, so no thank you.

[adina]

There's a correlation there... I don't mind the fact that organic food is "trendy" - just look at all the SUV's in the Whole Foods parking lot (and Whole Foods, for that matter). Some of it just tastes better too. Carrots, for instance - really!

).

Hey! That's me in my SUV in the Whole Foods parking lot!

I have a confession....eating healthy is not the only reason I shop there. It's also fun and pretty. I can get my latte right in the store, and everything looks so nice, I'm much more likely to cook if I shop there, as the whole process is more enjoyable.

[walterick]

"I have a confession....eating healthy is not the only reason I shop there. It's also fun and pretty. I can get my latte right in the store, and everything looks so nice, I'm much more likely to cook if I shop there, as the whole process is more enjoyable."

Heheh. You're such a girl

[adina]

"I have a confession....eating healthy is not the only reason I shop there. It's also fun and pretty. I can get my latte right in the store, and everything looks so nice, I'm much more likely to cook if I shop there, as the whole process is more enjoyable."

Heheh. You're such a girl

I try.

Love that pink. Can I set my text to permantly be pink?

[photophorous]

Hey! That's me in my SUV in the Whole Foods parking lot!

I have a confession....eating healthy is not the only reason I shop there. It's also fun and pretty. I can get my latte right in the store, and everything looks so nice, I'm much more likely to cook if I shop there, as the whole process is more enjoyable.

It sounds like your Whole Foods is a little different than ours. I prefer the produce, meat, and some of the packaged foods, but I can't stand shopping there. We have two here, and two Central Market stores which is a local competitor. All four stores have a terrible lay out, making it impossible to make a quick trip to grab some food. Plus, they are so popular you have to cruise the parking lot for 10 minutes to find a parking spot that's 10 feet wide and a 10 minute walk from the store, and then you have to shop in stop and go traffic. I really wish I could just make a quick stop, on the way home from work, to pick up some fresh food to cook for dinner. But it takes too long to do that, and it kind of defeats the purpose of getting fresh food when you only buy it once a week. I shop at Central Market sometimes, but other times I don't think it's worth the stress.

I need to find a farmers market.

[walterick]

No but it only takes 2 clicks to make it pink

Okay I need to go shower now.

[swmdrayfan]

I may be wrong, or maybe I just never noticed, but growing up in the 50's & 60's there never seemed to be this many problems with the foods we ate. With so many health issues and a bacterialogical explosion in the last 20 years, is it possible that we've overinocculated ourselves nearly to extinction? Are we overprotecting ourselves from bacteria, or have the standards of cleanliness and 'germ free' mindsets made us less immune to the things that in the mid-20th century we never worried about? Will society become like the Martians in 'War of the Worlds'--the simplest bacteria kills everyone off?

[Sushigaijin]

Food today is safer than it has ever been, but reporting is also better than it has ever been. Now every little problem is broadcast across the world before the body is even cold.

One issue that has increased is the scope of food related medical incidents - For instance, spinach has such a high rate of dispersion that the illness occurs in a much wider distribution than it would have 30 years ago. On the up side of things, we have far fewer food-related illness cases these days because the food is safer to begin with.

The composition of food today can be really scary though, with preservatives, additives, and flavorings that are obviously bad ideas - for instance, the use of several types of MSG in a food product.

A little MSG is a good thing, it opens up the taste buds and stimulates the sense of taste, improving food without changing the flavor. A lot of MSG is typically not good, because it IS toxic in high doses and causes the taste buds to become comatose. Some people have problems with it because it is a (very) mild stimulant and vasoconstrictor.

Normally you wouldn't ingest a critical amount of MSG in a meal, because a light sprinkling would be the dosage that would make sense to a consumer using it as a condiment. Now that MSG must be labeled on the food package, companies have found other methods of creating glutimates, the excitotoxins that make MSG what it is. Watch out for those autolyzed and hydrolyzed products in your food - it's possible that you are getting three or four seperate sources of "msg" even if MSG isn't in the product! Poison is in the dose.

Salt and sugar are scary like that too, but most people these days can recognise sugars (sucrose, corn syrup, glucose, sugar, cane juice, fruit juice, etc) and salts (anything with sodium in the name). They become problematic in hidden forms too - the human body can (usually) handle an unlimited amount of salt, you wouldn't want to eat something that was too salty for a person to process. Hide the salt in five or six different forms, and even weak cases of sodium induced hypertension can become dangerous.

Truth be told, I'm much more scared of that stuff than contamination in the supply chain, or even in environmental contamination. A few PCBs probably aren't going to hurt you - hell, they don't even KNOW if they are dangerous - PCBs are assumed to be dangerous because they are molecularly similar to dioxins, and the amount a person gets in his fish annually is as much as 15 times less than one would get from beef. Nobody worries about PCBs in beef, because the lobby makes sure of that. And because the levels are extremely low.

And mercury in fish is bunk science - there is not one shred of credible evidence that mercury contamination in fish is a result of mankind (although honestly some of it most definately is) or that the mercury found in fish is dangerous to man - in fact, the credible studies discount the mercury scare altogether. Not any more dangerous than it was 30 years ago, we just know how to scare you better.

Sorry for the rant, I've been in the food industry since I was 14, so it hits a little close to home. Don't fear the food, fear the companies that are producing the microwave meals that you have for lunch and the cheeseburger you got on the fly from mickey d's - they are the ones producing the scariest, most dangerous food; even if it is prepared correctly it is dangerous.
But hey, that mcgriddle is pretty dang good!

[adina]

The Whole Foods in Madison is like that, small narrow aisles, really cramped. I think the parking lot holds like 10 cars.

They just opened (Sept-ish) the one in Milwaukee. Huge space, really well laid out, and a huge underground parking structure. Being on the east side (Milwaukee's current trendy area) there is no way they'd ever have been able to get anyone there without underground parking.

[mwfanelli]

And mercury in fish is bunk science - there is not one shred of credible evidence that mercury contamination in fish is a result of mankind (although honestly some of it most definately is) or that the mercury found in fish is dangerous to man - in fact, the credible studies discount the mercury scare altogether. Not any more dangerous than it was 30 years ago, we just know how to scare you better.

Well, highly mercury-contaminated rivers have much higher levels of mercury in fish. Coincidence? Maybe but unlikely. Yes, eating normal amounts of fish is probably not harmful. But I doubt very much that eating a few servings of swordfish a week would be a good thing. Mercury, like many heavy metals, accumulates in the body, especially the fat. The more you ingest, the more that accumulates. Mercury, lead, and other heavy metals etc. are not easily eliminated from the body naturally.

The "Mad Hatter" references in old literature refers to the insanity of hatters caused by mercury poisoning (they used mercury to process felt). Yes, much more exposure than eating fish but does show the extreme danger.

Having a little heavy metal contamination in the food supply may not be bad in itself. But when you add up all the other sources or the distinctly non-average eating habits of people, calling mercury poisoning "bunk science" is irresponsible.

From the FDA web site:

"In the first episode, which occurred in Minimata, Japan, 111 people died or became very ill (mostly from nervous system damage) from eating fish (often daily over extended periods) from waters that were severely polluted with mercury from local industrial discharge.

Following a similar incident in Nigata, Japan, where 120 person were poisoned, studies showed that the harm caused by methyl mercury poisoning, particularly the neurological symptoms, can progress over a period of years after exposure has ended. The average mercury content of fish samples from both areas ranged from 9 to 24 ppm, though in Minimata, some fish were found to have levels as high as 40 ppm. Fortunately, no similar incidents have occurred in the United States.

The best indexes of exposure to methyl mercury are concentrations in hair and blood. The average concentrations of total mercury in non-exposed people is about 8 parts per billion (ppb) in blood and 2 ppm in hair. From the Japanese studies, toxicologists have learned that the lowest mercury level in adults associated with toxic effects (paresthesia) was 200 ppb in blood and 50 ppm in hair, accumulated over months to years of eating contaminated food."

[walterick]

I'm curious, Erik, given your background, what are your opinions on the artifical sweetners, particularly aspartame and sucralose?

Rick

[another view]

Not any more dangerous than it was 30 years ago, we just know how to scare you better.

Excellent point - and also that of McD's. The fish that are higher in the food chain, live a long time and in big water are the ones that seem to have the highest mercury levels. Although Lake Superior is very clean, the city of Duluth is at the lake's western edge and it is a city with a lot of industry. With predominately west and southwest winds in the area, the discharge from the smokestacks blows out over the lake. It takes the water 199 years to travel from the inlet in Duluth to the far end at Sault Ste. Marie (380 miles later). The higher-food chain fish eat what's lower on the food chain (obviously) and by the time they've lived and eaten for years, they'll show enough of a mercury level that it's worth noticing. I don't think anyone healthy would need to worry about it, but it's good to know - and more info than we probably had 30 years ago.

I do think that part of the problem is what we choose to do with all of this information...

[mjs1973]

Speaking of unsafe food. The wife and I ate at a mexican restuarnt tonight. I think they have Sam & Ella working in the kitchen. Who knew food could find it's way through 3 miles of intesines is such a short time. :blush2:

[walterick]

I do think that part of the problem is what we choose to do with all of this information...

You mean like, talk about it in the OT forum and then go out and eat it anyway?

[another view]

You mean like, talk about it in the OT forum and then go out and eat it anyway?

Kinda... Also like anti bacterial soap (trying not to split the thread here). We know about all the icky stuff we come in contact with now more than we did 30 years ago but I'll bet a lot of it is the same stuff just with a name. Regular soap and a good handwashing will take care of that stuff anyway, pull out the heavy duty stuff when you need it. Same with medicines, especially OTC stuff.

[Sushigaijin]

Emerging science is indicating that mercury in fish is NOT from man made sources (for the most part) and that the methyl mercury found in fish is more likely sourced from undersea volcanic activity. The amount of mercury in large tuna off Hawaii has not changed in the last hundred years, although the mercury levels in the water have doubled. The fish simply are not absorbing the manmade mercury there, or they have already reached saturation (which we know is not true). This may make a difference, because we are not seeing the same kind of mercury poisoning from fish as we should be seeing given the amount of mercury that some human populations are consuming. A recent study in the seychelles followed a population over (IIRC) 15 years and found the effects of mercury from fish sources to be negligable, even in vertical situations (mother to child). The average consumption of fish in the seychelles is at least 10x what americans eat, and they also consume the (very high mercury) pilot whales. You can probably find the exact study with a google search, I'm just working from memory.

Environmental mercury poisoning manifests differently than consumptive poisoning. If I were to eat a piece of fish with a drop of methyl mercury on it, it would effect me differently than if the fish ate and metabolized the mercury and it was concentrated in its flesh. That's just the way mercury poisoning works. Fish mercury poisoning would be a cumulative effect condition - it certainly wouldn't be fatal, and it would most likely be only measurable over a course of decades and generations. Definate cause to cut mercury emissions, but not enough to worry about in practical life. Fatal fish related mercury poisoning could only be caused by acute contamination, which would kill the fish just as quickly as it would kill the people.

There is a doctor in the SF area who has implicated fish mercury in a bunch of cases of confusion and memory problems, but those are not the symptoms that we would see in a fish mercury poisoning situation, rather they would be common in an environmental mercury contamination case. I haven't heard anything about her in a couple of years now, I wonder if she finally read the research that everyone else did or if she is still banging the fish is bad for you drum?

Mass deaths from toxic contamination are not uncommon in history. One of the reasons why PCBs are considered dangerous is because of a similar event in Japan where they were implicated in a mass of deaths - the cause was later determined to be mold contamination, but the levels of PCBs in the bad grain were high enough to concern the scientists examining the event, and were initially blamed for it.

as for sweeteners..

Do you know how they make the artificial sweetener that "tastes just like sugar because it's made from sugar?"

They take a sugar molecule and bond a chlorine molecule to it so that your body doesn't recognise it as sugar, and therefore doesn't absorb it. That's scary. Same theory behind that Olean oil that they were making chips with a few years ago, that gave people digestive problems. Body doesn't recognise or absorb it, so it just passes it as is.

Granulated sugar is sounding pretty good right now. And in normal quantities, most people have no problem processing it.