HFCS Contains Mercury and the FDA KNOWS It!

[Gannon]

For those who still want to put this poison into your systems...please read this article.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leslie..._b_161334.html


More things known about this problematic chemical...buried for the sake of unfettered corporate capitalism.


All Hail...hell.

[Retroit]

Does this mean I should stop drinking liquids that glow in the dark and stop eating treats that bear no resemblance to any agricultural products known to man?

Darn...and eating was getting to be so much fun.

[Corn.Bot]

It is this close to impossible >.< to find a packaged food or drink that does not contain HFCS [[not counting artificially-sweetened products, which have their own unique chemical issues). If the info in that link is true, then virtually everyone in the U.S. should all be a whole lot sicker than the majority of us appear to be. Physically, I mean. Regarding mentally, I guess we should all be as mad as hatters.

Then again, hmm.

[Gannon]

They said it was only tested in roughly 30 percent of the HFCS.

Mercury poisoning takes time to accumulate.

The effects are over generations, too, right?


This is a cumulative thing...we've had nearly twenty years of HFCS infiltration throughout our food supply...it may explain some of the auto-immune breakdowns that are becoming epidemic.

[Jimaz]

How did the heavy metal get in there? In making HFCS -- that "natural" sweetener, as the Corn Refiners Associaton likes to call it -- caustic soda is one ingredient used to separate corn starch from the corn kernel. Apparently most caustic soda for years has been produced in industrial chlorine [[chlor-alkali) plants, where it can be contaminated with mercury that it passes on to the HFCS, and then to consumers.

Caustic soda?! Ye gad, that means lutefisk could be doubly contaminated!

Garrison Keillor:

Every Advent we entered the purgatory of lutefisk, a repulsive gelatinous fishlike dish that tasted of soap and gave off an odor that would gag a goat. We did this in honor of Norwegian ancestors, much as if survivors of a famine might celebrate their deliverance by feasting on elm bark. I always felt the cold creeps as Advent approached, knowing that this dread delicacy would be put before me and I’d be told, "Just have a little." Eating a little was like vomiting a little, just as bad as a lot.

More humor at the Lutefisk link.

[Mikeg]

The products sampled in this study found mercury levels ranging from about 30 to 350 parts per trillion [[ppt). Current technology cannot measure mercury levels that are less than about 30 ppt. Most of the samples had non-detectable levels of mercury and the median level of mercury measured was 100 ppt. Coca Cola Classic measured 62 ppt mercury. PopTarts Frosted Blueberry measured 100 ppt mercury.

The EPA has set a limit of 2 parts per billion [[2 ppb) for mercury in drinking water. The FDA has set a limit of 1 part per million [[ppm) of mercury in seafood. [source]

62 ppt is the same as 0.062 ppb. The Coca Cola Classic had levels of mercury 32 times LESS than the EPA limit for drinking water.

100 ppt is the same as 0.0001 ppm. The Pop Tart had levels of mercury 10,000 times LESS than the FDA limit for seafood.

Should the HFCS manufacturers be prohibited from using mercury cell soda ash? Sure, but the trend has been heading away from that method of making soda ash for a long time now and it is almost obsolete.

Should you be worried about the trace levels of mercury found in certain products containing HFCS? I wouldn't lose any sleep over it!

[oladub]

There is a controversy about whether mercury in vacinations lead to autism. Silver fillings are illegal in Sweden because of their mercury level. The FDA not only closes its eyes when its corporate sponsors want it to, the FDA also does dirty work for those same corporations. Terminal cancer patients are not allowed to try "unproven" drugs by the FDA. Drug development is slowed and made very expensive. The FDA is also trying to essentially destroy the vitamin industry by putting it all under the control of the major pharmaceuticals. It should be no surprise that the FDA also overlooks the shortcomings of ADM and Cargill.
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off topic - Lutefisk, if cooked properly, and smothered in enough butter, is ok. I don't care for its texture tough. It stinks up the house for awhile but has no soapy taste. The one time I bought some in the grocery store and cooked it according to the directions didn't work out though. The kids wouldn't eat it. My wife and I ate some out of obligation. The leftovers were given to the cat who refused it.

We much prefer boiled or fried pollack mixed with mashed potatoes and butter. We picked that up from Norwegian neighbors in Santa Cruz who used to boil the meat off of the heads of salmon he caught [[ no waste) to mix with potatoes.

[ccbatson]

Sigh...more pseudo science. Quantity folks, it isn't a matter of nominal variables [[on or off), but how much. An innocuous amount of a heavy metal could easily be found in many many natural and not natural products....it is irrelevant.

[Ravine]

Yeah, what the hell. I probably took a few months off of my life, in grade school, when the nuns would hand out fresh copies of things which had just come out of the copier. You may remember, the purply stuff. I loved that smell, and used to deeeeeeply inhale the fumes. Yum.

With as much bad shit as I've done to myself, by choice, I'm not sure I have the right to get too worked up over the HFCS issue.

[ccbatson]

Nah...Humans can process and excrete a goodly amount of toxic stuff without suffering and ill effects.

[Ravine]

That's about how I look at it, Cc. If I start avoiding everything that could hurt me, the fact that I have stopped eating, drinking, and breathing will probably do me in, and right quick, too.

[Gistok]

Sigh...more pseudo science. Quantity folks, it isn't a matter of nominal variables [[on or off), but how much. An innocuous amount of a heavy metal could easily be found in many many natural and not natural products....it is irrelevant.

Cc.... correct me if I'm wrong, but you were up in arms about Cadmium on another thread...

[humanmachinery]

To give this some context, here’s an example of what the study found - there were 300 parts per trillion of mercury in Jack Daniel’s Barbecue Sauce. The Center for Science in the Public Interest says that’s still 30 to 3,000 times less than the amount of mercury found in fish and seafood.

The companies named in the IATP report defended their products, noting the very low levels of mercury detected. “You would have to eat more than 100 pounds of ketchup each day to even come close to reaching the EPA’s safe exposure level,” ConAgra spokeswoman Stephanie Childs tells the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

But some experts argue there is no safe level of exposure to mercury.

http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/healt...Cr8DNMK29abqU5

[Mikeg]

To give this some context,

"Context" was what entirely missing in that IATP report.

There was no statistical interpretation of their results nor was there any comparison to the FDA and EPA limits for mercury in food and water, which would have helped put their observations into the proper context. That's probably because their sample size was too small to draw any statistically valid conclusions plus when you convert their test results to the ppb and ppm levels of the FDA and EPA limits, it becomes apparent that the IATP could only find infinitesimally small levels of mercury from the HFCS in those products that had been made using the mercury cell process.

Therefore it's my considered opinion that this IATP report falls to the level of scaremongering.

[Lorax]

Nah...Humans can process and excrete a goodly amount of toxic stuff without suffering and ill effects.

Rather like your posts.

However, the jury's out on how much long-term damage has really been done to all of us.

[Pam]

It is this close to impossible >.< to find a packaged food or drink that does not contain HFCS

Not really. Read the labels. It seems like products that don't use it are increasing.

[Lorax]

Thanks George Tush, for defunding the EPA, and allowing the foxes to run the henhouse.

A decimated agency that allowed poisoned pet food and lead in toys from China, mercury levels in fish, posionous drugs, which I posted on some other thread, which killed people.

A superb example of Rethuglican defunding of the hated "government" in favor of "free market" capitalism

[Gannon]

It is MY considered opinion that anything that can shine a little light up the dark recesses of the Food and Drug Administration's arcane intercoursing with Corporate Pharmaceuticals is well worth the effort!

[Corn.Bot]

Not really. Read the labels. It seems like products that don't use it are increasing.

Reading labels is how I learned how pervasive the use of HFCS had become. Once I started paying attention, I was shocked to find so many so-called healthy foods [[i.e., yogurt) containing it. You are right because more recently, I have begun to find an increase in products not using it... and the price difference, as well. SIGH.

[Corn.Bot]

Yeah, what the hell. I probably took a few months off of my life, in grade school, when the nuns would hand out fresh copies of things which had just come out of the copier. You may remember, the purply stuff. I loved that smell, and used to deeeeeeply inhale the fumes. Yum.

With as much bad shit as I've done to myself, by choice, I'm not sure I have the right to get too worked up over the HFCS issue.

You are talking about MIMEOGRAPH INK and I wish I could find that fragrance bottled or in an incense stick. OOOOHHHHH. It's been forever but what a pleasant memory.

I am beginning to think I should blame HFCS for my enhanced circumference, a physical change I never experienced prior to the last few years. As far as I can tell from looking at my living relatives and photos of my ancestors, my loss of waistline and gain of chubby belly is not from genetic predisposition.

The only real change to my eating habits is the increased incidence of HFCS in the foods I purchase. The only real change to my food-buying habits has been an increase in packaged items I thought I might save time by using. So, as a kind of experiment, I have stopped buying some of the HFCS-containing conveniences and went back to scratch-cooking at home... I want to see if I can have a shape besides "round" without actually changing my diet.

Unscientific and not well-controlled for an experiement, but what the heck.

[Jimaz]

I think they were actually "spirit duplicators" rather than mimeographs. According to duplicating machines, mimeographs were odorless. The spirit scent would have been from simple methyl alcohol which is toxic but common.

[ccbatson]

Lorax, take off the blinders...this subject is making a story out of levels way below significance. If you believe what you read in this story, you are being duped. We, the rational minded folks, are pointing this out to save you the trouble of being so duped.

[Gannon]

Cc, take off YOUR blinders...this subject of this story is we don't know truly the levels of significance. If you believe what you've been taught regarding toxicity, you are duping others with the UNTRUE assumption that medicine knows everything about everything, including complex INTERACTIONS of substances, including man-made ones since the last toxicity approximate average over all the population was determined. We, the rational minded folks, are pointing this out to save you the trouble of being so much of a problem perpetuating a system of accumulated human inaccuracies covered in undue and unearned sanctity and protected by professional courtesy.


I don't want ANY mercury contamination if it accumulates in a system. We already know trace amounts collect in fish...a notch down from us on the chain, usually.

So...can we agree to be at loggerheads on this one? I am also in the camp of the preponderance of evidence of damage to infants from modern vaccinations, including the 'unknown' link to increased autism rates...and mercury has been one of the leading causation triggers.

I think consuming chemicals wantonly is silly. Chemicals delivered by firms who profit from our addictions and dependencies on them, especially so. Proven dangerous chemicals that may indeed stay with you for a while...beyond silly!


I'm just sayin'.

[ccbatson]

Sigh...How about finding a single case of verifiable Mercury poisoning or toxicity in a human being proven to have been caused by one of these sources. Mind you, these products have been around for a very long time, more than enough time for 1 single example to have appeared...and yet???

[Mikeg]

I think consuming chemicals wantonly is silly

Your body is an autonomous chemical conversion plant as well as a chemical energy powered device which alters the chemicals it extracts from those natural, organic, locally-grown foods you wantonly consume and then discharges waste chemicals into the environment. Maybe you should petition the government to regulate your bodily functions just in case someone does an unscientific study that points an accusatory finger at one of the chemicals you discharge.