USDA's Version of Food Safety?

mmiller@pcsia.com
Thu, 16 Dec 1999 07:45:19 -0600

"...'Irradiated fats tend to become rancid." (??more quickly??) "Even at
low doses, some irradiated foods lose 20 percent of sensitive vitamins such
as C, E, K, and B complex,' the association says. Ionizing radiation is so
powerful that it knocks electrons out of atoms and creates free radicals,
the group and other critics claim. "These free radicals react with food
components, creating new radiolytic products, some of which are toxic -
benzene, formaldehyde, lipid peroxides - and some of which may be unique to
irradiated foods." Studies on animals fed irradiated foods have shown
increased tumors, reproductive failures and kidney damage, the group claims."

Irradiation is another example of a technology searching for a problem to
justify it's existence. What happened to steam autoclaving so recently
touted as the solution to 0157 in meats caused by fecal contamination in
the packing plants? What about cleaning up the meat packing operation in
the first place?

Didn't a Purdue or Cornell study show the 0157 problem could be solved by
switching from corn to grass and allowing the animal's digestive track to
return to normal a few weeks before slaughter?

Just what we need, food with even fewer essential nutrients and more free
radicals than that which industrial ag is producing now.

Mike Miller

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