A little mercury with your soda?
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Care for a side of neurotoxins with your soda?
A new study published in Environmental Health confirms that mercury, a known neurotoxin, contaminates almost half of the high fructose corn syrup currently on the market. Another study published by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy found that almost one-third of popular, processed foods containing HFCS as the first or second ingredient under the nutritional label tested positive for mercury. According to the IATP, those foods testing positive for mercury contamination included Quaker, Hershey’s, Kraft and Smuckers.
This isn’t isolated.
The most disturbing aspect of the story is that several tests were done in 2005 when the contamination was brought to the attention of the FDA, and the FDA failed to do anything to protect consumers from continued exposure. Yeah, and they try to tell us raw milk is dangerous, but drinking mercury-contaminated sodas is fine?
Mercury is dangerous to human health and it is known neurotoxin. Symptoms of mercury toxicity include loss of feeling, paralysis, loss of vision, congenital malformations and other serious issues. While exposure to large amounts of mercury may even cause death, what is uncertain is what effects minute, long-term exposure – such as that arising from regularly ingesting small quanitites in contaminated sweeteners – might do.
The greatest concern is for children and adolescents who are still developing as they tend to consume more high fructose corn syrup than the average adult – and therefore are at greater risk of ingesting mercury from contaminated sources.
The problem arises during the manufacture of high fructose corn syrup. To extract the corn starch from the corn kernel, manufacturers often use caustic soda produced in chlorine plants. The use of mercury cells in the manufacture of caustic soda contaminates the corn starch, and subsequently the high fructose corn syrup. Incidentally, for this reason you should not use or eat corn starch.
Add this to all the other reasons you should not eat high fructose corn syrup. Is anyone else wondering how the Corn Refiners Association is going to try to recover from this news? Are we going to see a special new series of sweet surprise commercials outlining how mercury is natural and fine in moderation?
LOL! The thought of them trying to create an ad campaign to weasel their way out of this seems totally ludicrous.
FoodRenegade´s last post: Another killer reason to avoid packaged foods.
[...] by dairyfreemom on January 27, 2009 I first saw it here, then here. Just to make sure this was for real, I googled it and found it [...]
Hee hee! Right! Mercury is fine in moderation. I love it!
cheeseslave´s last post: How To Save $1500 With Cloth Diapers.
Wow! Thanks for sharing.
Rachel´s last post: Tidbits about me.
Wow. This is yet another example of how the FDA has changed their stance from “something must be proven safe to be allowed” to “something must be proven unsafe to be banned”. It’s really sad. And HFCS isn’t just in sodas. It’s in ketchup, relish, and a lot of things you wouldn’t suspect.
Spinner´s last post: Two steps forward, one step back.
Just found your blog and am enjoying it very much!
I agree the HFCS is not good for you but the research behind the mercury in HFCS is questionable. Finding trace amounts in HFCS would not be the basis for me to not eat HFCS just like finding trace amounts in fish will not stop me from eating seafood. For another perspective on this story please see http://junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/2009/01/latest-scare-du-jour-mercury-in-hfcs.html
I don’t agree with everything on that blog but I respect the research she does on reported stories. And that she challenges the scientific studies that come out. For the record I am pro-WAPF, alternative medicine, and the such but I want to learn from both sides.
I’ve read a lot about this today. It’s funny, like we needed another reason to hate HFCS.
Michelle @ What Does Your Body Good?´s last post: Ayurveda, Skincare, and Not Slipping in the Shower.
Since mercury-free HFCS is readily available, which it is, why not use that instead? Because manufacturers care about the health of their bottom line more than that of their customers. Sweet.
The Runaway Lawyer´s last post: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Now with Tasty Mercury!.
I am so glad I stopped drinking soda! It was so hard too, they make that stuff so addictive, like heroin. Ya I bet they would say that was good in moderation too, after all coca~cola had it in there. And another note, HFCS has mercury because of manufacturing, fish have it because we dumped it into there home.
Coke was safer when it just had cane sugar and a little cocaine in it! Hey, uranium and arsenic are “natural” too! Corn-based ethanol, while being too water-intensive a crop to be logical (therefore likely to be pushed by the gov’t!), may be this country’s saving grace, get this HFCS back out of the food supply. But I won’t hold my breath…
Great comments! I agree: the profit motive is driving the food market, regardless of the effect on the people’s health.
Re mercury in fish. Of course, yes, it’s all things in moderation.
However I find once I know something, it’s really hard to UNknow it…
Elisabeth´s last post: Homemade yogurt.
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