Why is our beloved food causing us harm?

[DaveC426913]

still births and early childhood moralities that heavily bias this statistic toward lower ages.

The morality of early childhood is beyond reproach. Their mortality on the other hand...

Even in biblical times people lived into their eighties and longer.

Well, in bibilical times, people lived well into their eight hundreds.

 

[edward]

Up until the last 100 years or so there were few food additives, they now number in the thousands. My question is whether or not we can adapt to them in our diets as fast as new additives are being added to our food supply.? I had no clue that if a food item states cellulose on the label that cellulose most likely comes from wood pulp.

If the item states; "high in fiber or increased fiber" on the label" Think twice and check out the total cellulose in your diet. Too much fiber in your diet is not always a good thing. Keep well hydrated or you will end up with an impacted bowel. From personal experience I discovered that becoming a little dehydrated doesn't even score a 1 on discomfort while that impacted bowel is going to score a 10 on a list of the non fatal things you don't want to have

Why Wood Pulp Makes Ice Cream Creamier.

One of an array of factory-made additives, cellulose is increasingly used by the processed-food industry, producers say. Food-product makers use it to thicken or stabilize foods, replace fat and boost fiber content, and cut the need for ingredients like oil or flour, which are getting more expensive.

Cellulose products, gums and fibers allow food manufactures to offer white bread with high dietary fiber content, low-fat ice cream that still feels creamy on the tongue, and allow cooks to sprinkle cheese over their dinner without taking time to shred.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703834804576300991196803916

15 Food Companies That Serve You 'Wood'

http://www.thestreet.com/story/11012915/1/cellulose-wood-pulp-never-tasted-so-good.html

A few of the cellulose derivatives are listed below.

A number of chemically modified forms of cellulose are used in food processing for their special properties, including: (1)Carboxymethylcellulose, which is prepared from the pure cellulose of cotton or wood. It absorbs up to fifty times its own weight of water to form a stable colloidal mass. It is used, together with stabilizers, as a whipping agent, in ice‐cream, confectionery, jellies, etc., and as an inert filler in ‘slimming aids’.(2)Methylcellulose, which differs from carboxymethylcellulose (and other gums) since its viscosity increases rather than decreases with increasing temperature. Hence it is soluble in cold water and forms a gel on heating. It is used as a thickener and emulsifier, and in foods formulated to be low in gluten.(3)Other cellulose derivatives used as emulsifiers and stabilizers are hydroxypropylcellulose, hydroxypropyl‐methylcellulose, and ethyl‐methylcellulose.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O39-cellulosederivatives.html

 

[DaveC426913]

Is wood pulp ... something people are dying of?
Just wondering about relevance here.

 

[JonDE]

Is it? Or are we just eradicating all the things that used to kill us younger?

Something has to kill us.

It seems by this post and other posts that you are saying that its just an effect of the population growing older, and older people have a higher risk of cancer (the second part I don't disagree with). This guy seems to think that it is very much not the case.

Around the 4 minute mark he begins to debunk this "myth". He shows studies citing increase in childhood rates, regional rates, shows how it is not connected to race, and shows increase rates in age standardized studies over time.

 

[zoobyshoe]

This guy...

I googled and found he's a little bit suspicious since he's peddling a book he wrote and an anti-cancer lifestyle. I'd like to see independent sources for his statistics.

http://www.healingjourneys.org/20-new-anticancer-rules/

 

[zoobyshoe]

Also, it seems he died in 2011 of cancer at age 50:

PARIS — Dr. David Servan-Schreiber, a psychiatrist and best-selling author whosecancer diagnosis at the age of 31 compelled him to explore and then popularize the use of natural and holistic methods in dealing with cancer and depression, died on July 24 in a hospital near Fécamp, France. He was 50.

The cause was brain cancer, which had recurred last year, his brother Franklin said...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/30/world/europe/30servan.html?_r=0

 

[JonDE]

I googled and found he's a little bit suspicious since he's peddling a book he wrote and an anti-cancer lifestyle. I'd like to see independent sources for his statistics.

http://www.healingjourneys.org/20-new-anticancer-rules/

He cites all his sources in his presentation, and they seem to be from published studies and reputable sources. Example the childhood cancer rate is taken from here

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(05)66728-1/abstract
a study published by The Lancet, a medical journal. His next statistic is on breast cancer rates and is taken from the IARC, which is part of the WHO. It is possible that all of the studies are not well accepted, I'm not really an expert on such things, and don't really have time to go through it all. Maybe I'm just a sucker for a good presentation, and we were shown the presentation in college, which may have influenced me.

Also, it seems he died in 2011 of cancer at age 50:http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/30/world/europe/30servan.html?_r=0

Does that even matter though? He starts out the presentation by saying that he developed brain cancer twice before starting his research on it and battled it for 20 years.

 

[zoobyshoe]

He cites all his sources in his presentation, and they seem to be from published studies and reputable sources. Example the childhood cancer rate is taken from here

http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(05)66728-1/abstract
a study published by The Lancet, a medical journal. His next statistic is on breast cancer rates and is taken from the IARC, which is part of the WHO. It is possible that all of the studies are not well accepted, I'm not really an expert on such things, and don't really have time to go through it all. Maybe I'm just a sucker for a good presentation, and we were shown the presentation in college, which may have influenced me.

He may be right, but the lancet article seemed to be part of a debate among experts on the issue of childhood cancer, not an undisputed claim.

Basically, I don't have the patience to watch a 50+ minute video and comb it for studies.

Does that even matter though? He starts out the presentation by saying that he developed brain cancer twice before starting his research on it and battled it for 20 years.

Separate issue: it seemed at first glance to make bunk out of his anti-cancer lifestyle. However, it could be interpreted the opposite way, that his lifestyle allowed him to extend his life 20 years. Hard to say.

 

[edward]

Is wood pulp ... something people are dying of?
Just wondering about relevance here.

Perhaps not, I just thought I was going to die. :) And I do believe that I expanded well beyond wood pulp It is all of the cellulose derivatives that have me concerned. Admittedly the way pulp is originally produced set off my alarm bells. Then, unless it is just added as fiber, it is further synthesized and chemically treated to make the various food additives.

Take Dow Chemicals FDA approved ethyl cellulose. It was approved based on information provided by the manufacturer. I couldn't decide whether the product was approved, or just the method by which it is manufactured, because both were described.

In the pdf text it states, not to be used in food for infants and toddlers. Yet when I word search approved uses, in table 3, infants and toddlers are not mentioned. Can we just presume that train car loads of this, generally recognized as safe, additive will always end up in the correct vat?

If it is generally recognized as safe why is it that it can not be used in foods for infants and toddlers? I can't cut and paste pdf text. Just word search infants. Then word search table 3.

http://www.fda.gov/ucm/groups/fdagov-public/@fdagov-foods-gen/documents/document/ucm360908.pdf

 

[mheslep]

It seems from this page we are born to die of some form of cancer, we have been eating meat since the dawn of humanity so why is our food killing us?
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/eating-meat-officially-raises-cancer-risk?tgt=nr

It is processed meat that's found to up the risk of cancer, e.g hotdogs. Not unprocessed chicken, beef, etc.

 

[edward]

It is processed meat that's found to up the risk of cancer, e.g hotdogs. Not unprocessed chicken, beef, etc.

Everything is processed judging by the number of food additives. Even unprocessed meats appear to cause cancer if cooked at a high temperature.

http://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/diet/cooked-meats-fact-sheet

 

[mheslep]

Everything is processed judging by the number of food additives. Even unprocessed meats appear to cause cancer if cooked at a high temperature.

http://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/diet/cooked-meats-fact-sheet

The processed meat study refers to "salting, curing, fermenting or smoking ", not additives. Hot dogs. Bacon.

 

[empathy44]

This argument presupposes we know how many people died from cancer (at any age) in the past; which we don't. It also presupposes that environment and food was uniformly superior because it lacked some of the things we've introduced into our food, which it often was decidedly not.

 

[DaveC426913]

This argument presupposes we know how many people died from cancer (at any age) in the past; which we don't. It also presupposes that environment and food was uniformly superior because it lacked some of the things we've introduced into our food, which it often was decidedly not.

Which argument?

Use the quote feature please.

 

[empathy44]

Which argument?

Use the quote feature please.

Every argument in this thread I guess. I liked your contention that we see more of cancer because we live longer, but we really don't know how many people died from cancer before it could be so reliably diagnosed. So, even given greater age and probability of eventually developing cancer, we don't know if it's more or less than we'd see given the same life span in, say, the 1920's

Do preservatives cause more cancer than eating unprotected/adulterated food?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1518971/

 

[DaveC426913]

we really don't know how many people died from cancer before it could be so reliably diagnosed.

I think we do. Since most of em died from infection, disease, injury, malnutrition, infant mortality, TB, plague, typhoid - cancer didn't stand a chance.

 

[jim mcnamara]

There is a basic concept in Biology - HE - Heredity Environment interaction. Different combinations of genes in individuals of one species of organism can respond radically different to the same environmental challenge. One type of challenge is the presence of extant relatively new man made chemicals. Humans did not evolve in the presence of those chemicals so the responses may be very unfavorable to individual survival.

Two points:
1. in your kitchen right now there are approximately 100 or more man made chemicals that are not naturally occurring, and were not available to chemistry researchers 100 years ago.
2. Natural Selection works on the basis of differential survival of individuals in a population. Based on genetic traits. Human population is huge compared to the past, and therefore there are large numbers (as Mathematicians use the term) of heretofore 'untested' gene combinations running around.

Also, cancer is not new, it is one of the consequences of being able to evolve - sort of a nasty side effect. Hadrosaurs - plant eating dinosaurs - had lots of cancer as found in fossil bone tissue:
http://www.nature.com/news/1998/031020/full/news031020-2.html

 

[empathy44]

Hi empathy:

Do today's preservatives cause more cancer than eating food protected by the means used 100 years ago or earlier?​

As I understand it, the at-home food preserving techniques used 100 years ago made preserved food pretty safe from bacterial contamination. I think that commercial techniques then were also good, and did not involve the enormous range of chemicals used today.

First, I want to say I'm not defending stuffing our meat to the proverbial (or literal) gills with all manner of chemicals.

From the article cited:

"WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies processed meat — meat altered through salting, curing, fermenting or smoking [emphasis mine] — as a Group 1 carcinogen. This group of cancer-causing agents also includes smoking and asbestos. The ranking means there’s convincing evidence linking the modified meats to colorectal cancer, evidence as strong as that linking smoking to cancer."

These are all forms of home preservation that have been around for a very long time.

• Saying processed meat is carcinogenic isn't the same thing as saying it's much more carcinogenic than in the past. They found a correlation between eating lots of processed red meat and an increase in cancers (66 out of a thousand)--particularly colorectal, bowel and prostate cancers. People who ate the least red meat developed fewer cancers (56 out of 1000).

• They are only talking about processed meats.

• They go on to suggest what changed may simply have been the amount of meat we eat. This is not the same thing as saying that our meat is more carcinogenic.

 

[mheslep]

They go on to suggest what changed may simply have been the amount of processed meat we eat.​

z

Recall that the processing refers to salting, smoking, curing meats. That's been going for centuries, at one time the only way to preserve meat for a time. I'm not sure that more meat so processed is consumed now or not.

 

[mheslep]

Hi mheslep:

Nowadays, "processing" also includes adding additives,...

Yes, but on the subject of meats, only the processes I listed (smoking, salting, etc) are the ones noted to increase the rate of cancer in the recent study referenced in this thread. There's no evidence quoted in this thread about a particular meat additive causing cancer. None. Perhaps they exist, but have not been referenced here.

 

[gleem]

Nowadays, "processing" also includes adding additives, lots of different kinds, some known to be carcinogenic,

So the FDA is falling down on the job permitting known carcinogens onto the market?

Here is a site that lists know carcinogens

http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancer...cinogens/known-and-probable-human-carcinogens

Many are industrial chemicals some may be produced by the processing some occur naturally. They have different powers for producing cancer. I have heard that gram for gram aflaitoxin produced by a mold on grain and peanuts is the most carcinogenic (for liver cancer) substance that could occur in the food chain.

Some substances as cadmium and lead occur in soil and are taken up by plants used from which products are made , one common one is cocoa powder. However these are permitted in concentrations lower that standards set by the Feds.

Alcohol is on the list and yes it is connected to oral cavity, throat and esophageal cancers in heavy drinkers with smoking exacerbating the problem but it is not producing a pandemic of these cancers.

The carcinogenic effect varies with exposure and below certain concentrations the cancer rate from these substances can become unobservable in the general population .

 

[gleem]

This is a very interesting article about the history of labeling of food and medicines. published by the FDA

http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/WhatWeDo/History/Overviews/ucm056044.htm

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Is deli meat processed? Like if I go to the deli counter and get a 1/2 pound of sliced turkey. That is considered processed?

 

[gleem]

I believe it is especially if it is wrapped in plastic film. If you notice that such turkey has a slightly off taste that get worse as it gets older and becomes slimier .as compared to fresh roasted turkey.

 

[DaveC426913]

I believe it is especially if it is wrapped in plastic film. If you notice that such turkey has a slightly off taste that get worse as it gets older and becomes slimier .as compared to fresh roasted turkey.

I am fairly certain there is a more rigorous definition of 'processed' than this.

 

[wolram]

Is deli meat processed? Like if I go to the deli counter and get a 1/2 pound of sliced turkey. That is considered processed?

http://www.today.com/food/5-things-you-need-know-about-deli-meats-2D80554934

Have a read of this Greg, warning it may make you sick.