It should come as no surprise – today, everyone is TOXIC, and I don’t mean they give off bad energy. I mean that our bodies are all exposed to things that we don’t want IN our bodies. Back in the day, people talked about leaded gasoline and paint. So lead was taken out of gas and paint. But interestingly, jet fuel is still leaded and exhausts continue to spew lead into the atmosphere.
What people don’t talk about is what happened to all that lead? Obviously, lead is heavy. It falls (out of the sky from planes), but it used to spew out of car exhausts. Where did it all go?
Mostly, it dropped to the pavement, or was aerosolized and carried short distances to land on some property. And then it drained into the soil, or perhaps the water supply. Ultimately, it ends up in the food supply, amongst other places. Point being that it can end up in us.
There are now over 30,000 chemicals that have been created that are “new to nature”. The vast majority of them have not been tested for safety. The government actually has a certification known as GRAS that specifically states it has not been tested for safety (GRAS stands for Generally Regarded as Safe – an extrapolation from some similar products previously evaluated). Lots and lots of “stuff” gets into the environment and years later someone figures out it not good for us.
The CNN report (don’t get political – it’s health news!) summarizes a toxicology paper that describes how food packaging materials have been demonstrated to leak into foods they are holding. And a number of those chemicals end up in the humans that eat the food. BPA was one of the chemicals that only relatively recently was declared as a bad actor and mostly removed from packaging (think baby bottles in the microwave!! Yikes).
These kinds of toxicities drive all kinds of health issues. Understanding your level of personal toxic burden can be very helpful in avoiding future disasters. Understanding your personal genetic tendencies in how well you are able to clear these toxins is another important piece of the puzzle to potentially keeping out of the TOXIC SOUP that may all await us if we keep on our current path.
If any of these things concern you, please, let’s have a conversation.
FROM CNN HEALTH / BY SANDEE LAMOTTE
Chemicals linked to breast cancer leach into our foods, study finds
Nearly 200 chemicals connected to breast cancer are used in the making of food packaging and plastic tableware, and dozens of those carcinogens can migrate into the human body, a new study found.
“There is strong evidence that 76 known or potential breast carcinogens from food contact materials recently purchased all over the world can be found in people,” said study coauthor Jane Muncke, managing director and chief scientific officer at the Food Packaging Forum, a nonprofit foundation based in Zurich, Switzerland, that focuses on science communication and research.
“Getting rid of these known or suspected carcinogens in our food supply is a huge opportunity for cancer prevention,” Muncke said.
Of the recently detected chemicals in food packaging, 40 are already classified as hazardous by regulatory agencies around the world, according to the study.
“So many of these chemicals have already been classified as human health hazards, yet they are still allowed to be used in food contact materials, thus allowing them to migrate into the food we eat,” said Jenny Kay, a research scientist at Silent Spring Institute, a scientific research organization focused on the link between chemicals, women’s health and breast cancer. She was not involved in the study.
Rates of early-onset breast cancer in women under 50 are increasing, and experts said the trend cannot be explained by genetics alone.
“Rates of colon cancer are also rising in younger people,” said Dr. Len Lichtenfeld, former deputy chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society who was not involved in the study.
“Is it obesity? Is it alcohol? Is it the lack of physical activity? Is it environmental? There are a lot of reasons,” Lichtenfeld said, “and it’s going to take a long time to sort which has the most impact, as some of these chemicals may be high risk, some low risk.”
The Consumer Brands Association, which represents the consumer products industry, told CNN that its members adhere to the US Food and Drug Administration’s evidence-based safety standards.
“Packaging exists to protect and keep food safe for consumption,” said Sarah Gallo, the association’s senior vice president of product policy and federal affairs, in an email.
“The FDA reviews and approves food contact substances through their science and risk-based system before they go to market,” Gallo said. “The agency’s post market review also provides continuous safety analysis and regulation of the approved substances.”
The FDA has been under fire for its failure to act quickly on health concerns about some 14,000 chemicals known to be added to food. The agency will hold a public meeting Wednesday to present its ideas on how to improve its post-market food analyses.
Possible breast carcinogens
In 2007, Silent Spring published a list of 216 chemicals that can cause mammary tumors in rodents — a key method for determining toxicity, according to experts.
A January 2024 update to that list found 921 possibly carcinogenic chemicals, including 642 that may stimulate estrogen or progesterone production, another known risk factor for breast cancer.
“The fact that so many potential breast carcinogens are present in food packaging and can migrate into our food is just one example of how many chemicals we are unwittingly exposed to every day,” said Kay, who coauthored the 2024 study update published in Environmental Health Perspectives.
“Many of the mammary carcinogens are hormone disruptors, too, and many of the chemicals on our list can also damage DNA,” she said. “Consumers should not have to keep track of all of the scientific literature on what chemicals to avoid. It should be on regulators to recognize the danger and take action.”
Carcinogens in plastic, paper and cardboard
The new study, published Tuesday in the journal Frontiers in Toxicology, compared the Silent Springs database of known carcinogens for breast cancer with the Database on Food Contact Chemicals Monitored in Humans, or FCChumon.
FCChumon, created by the Food Packaging Forum, is a list of food contact chemicals that have been detected in human breast milk, blood, urine and tissues.
“The new study took our list of potential breast carcinogens and compared it to their list of chemicals that have been found in food contact materials to find out which of potential breast carcinogens could be getting into people’s diets,” Kay said. “That’s a great way to prioritize chemicals for regulatory action.”
The study found such chemicals as benzene, a known carcinogen connected to breast cancers in animals and people; 4,4’-Methylenebis-(2-Chloroaniline), a probable carcinogen linked to bladder cancer; 2,4-Toluenediamine, found to cause breast and other cancers in animals; and 3,3′-Dimethylbenzidine and o-Toluidine, which are dyes used to color plastic and paper.
“Dyes can be used in plastics, paper, cardboard and the like and can have some pretty toxic properties,” Kay said. “Plastics are not the only culprit.”
In fact, while the study found most of the exposure to carcinogens came from plastics used in food packaging, 89 suspected carcinogens were found in paper and cardboard containers.
“Paper has additives such as emulsifiers and adhesives, say if papers are glued together, or there’s a plastic layer glued to the paper,” Muncke said.
PFAS, phthalates and other worrisome chemicals are used to make plastic soft and flexible and to produce grease-proof food containers.
A number of the chemicals found in the study were bisphenols, phthalates or perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, known as PFAS — worrisome chemicals that have been linked to many health concerns.
Often called “forever chemicals” because they do not break down in the environment, PFAS are used in food packaging to prevent grease and water from soaking through food wrappers and beverage cups. PFAS can also be found in the ink used to print logos and instructions on food containers.
Chemicals in the PFAS family are linked to high cholesterol, cancer and various chronic diseases as well as a limited antibody response to vaccines in both adults and children, according to a report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
Phthalates have been linked to childhood obesity, asthma, cardiovascular issues, cancer and premature death in people ages 55 to 64.
Bisphenol A, or BPA, is an endocrine disruptor that has been linked to fetal abnormalities, low birth weight, and brain and behavior disorders in infants and children. In adults, the chemical has been linked to the development of diabetes, heart disease, erectile dysfunction, cancer and a 49% higher risk of early death within 10 years.
Steps to take to reduce exposure
While it’s up to regulatory agencies to make sweeping changes to protect the food supply, there are steps consumers can take to reduce the risk of toxic chemicals and carcinogens, according to Silent Spring.