Poison in High Fructose Corn Syrup

One of the main reasons why we Americans are so fat is the substance called High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS in short).

Back in the day, when I was a young, naive hippie and just starting this blog, I profiled this disgusting shit (article is here, if you are interested).

The gist of my article and any food professional's (and most doctors) opinion is this: HFCS is bad, very bad for your health, and, unfortunately, it is in EVERYTHING edible and drinkable in this country.

A new study just came out, profiled in the Washington Post, advising us of yet another danger of HFCS to our health.

The title of it should give you a shock, as it is simply

Study Finds High-Fructose Corn Syrup Contains Mercury

MONDAY, Jan. 26 (HealthDay News) -- Almost half of tested samples of commercial high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) contained mercury, which was also found in nearly a third of 55 popular brand-name food and beverage products where HFCS is the first- or second-highest labeled ingredient, according to two new U.S. studies.

HFCS has replaced sugar as the sweetener in many beverages and foods such as breads, cereals, breakfast bars, lunch meats, yogurts, soups and condiments. On average, Americans consume about 12 teaspoons per day of HFCS, but teens and other high consumers can take in 80 percent more HFCS than average.

"Mercury is toxic in all its forms. Given how much high-fructose corn syrup is consumed by children, it could be a significant additional source of mercury never before considered. We are calling for immediate changes by industry and the [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] to help stop this avoidable mercury contamination of the food supply," said the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy's Dr. David Wallinga, a co-author of both studies.

In the first study, researchers found detectable levels of mercury in nine of 20 samples of commercial HFCS. The study was published in current issue of Environmental Health.

In the second study, the agriculture group found that nearly one in three of 55 brand-name foods contained mercury. The chemical was most common in HFCS-containing dairy products, dressings and condiments.

The use of mercury-contaminated caustic soda in the production of HFCS is common. The contamination occurs when mercury cells are used to produce caustic soda.

This explains autism.

This explains the incredible sickness rates of Americans as opposed to Europeans.

This is simply horrifying, because the disgusting, poisonous HFCS is in almost everything you eat and drink, from your soda (almost EVERY soda) through bread, cakes, flavored "health" drinks, yogurts, cereals for your kids, your medicines...

Fuck it, here is a partial list (long load time - pages and pages):
accidentalhedonist.com.

It is, realistically, unavoidable to live in America and NOT ingest this shit into your body.

I know - I try to limit it... it is the best that one can do.

Do an experiment - grab as many foodstuffs and anything you buy from a store to drink (with the obvious exception of water) and look at the ingredients.

I guarantee it that you will find this poison in over 90% of your foodstuffs/beverages.

Bonus Material or Holy Shit!

From the ethicurean.com article:

That much-debated sweetener, high-fructose corn syrup, is going to need more than a pricey PR campaign to fix this one.

After one set of scientists found mercury — yes, everyone’s favorite brain-impairing element — in almost half of commercial HFCS, another bunch of scientists decided to get specific and tested 55 common consumer products that use HFCS. And guess what? Almost a third of them contain mercury.

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.

I am going to gag.

That’s all bad enough, especially considering no level of mercury is considered safe and that it’s especially toxic to growing brains — that is, the brains of the people consuming the highest levels of HFCS (children) and the brains of babies in utero. (See the figures in the report.) Worse: People at the FDA and USDA knew about the presence of mercury in HFCS and did nothing about it.

According to a press release from the IATP, Renee Dufault, the lead author in the first study (”Mercury from chlor-alkali plants: measured concentrations in food product sugar,” published today in Environmental Health [PDF; abstract here]), was working at the FDA when the commercial HFCS was tested. The IATF release reports, “While the FDA had evidence that commercial HFCS was contaminated with mercury four years ago, the agency did not inform consumers, help change industry practice or conduct additional testing.”

Now I am going to gag and become mad at the same time.


Yet more Bonus, or a shout from DIGG

DIGG'er Ferre1 has just sent a shout to me re: this article

I just digged your article on high fructose corn syrup and I have a tip for you to do some checking into, I don't think that's mentioned anywhere. Aspartane, also known as Aspartame and a few other names, requires the use of a chemical called "toluene", Aspartane must have traces of toluene, a highly cancerous substance which has a half life of hundreds of years and does not leave the body. Check it out I'd say, I kid you not, I worked at a chemical plant that produced it and know first hand.

Here's the chemical process for that stuff: http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6335461.html (scroll down to the process, lots of that stuff leave traces btw, not just toluene)

The problem is that in theory most chemicals used in the production process are washed away, this is true for a laboratory setting where a chemist makes a very small batch and "washes" the end result very thorough to rinse the residue away, however, in an industrial process this doesn't work that way, amolunts are just too big and the process too fast. So, on paper everything looks ok because tests are always done in small batches in laboratory settings but in reality many chemical food additives have pollutants because of the industrial scale of the production process. (how I know? I worked for companies like Monsanto, Dupont, Bayer, etc. in the past.)

It makes sense. Theoretically, it should be washed away, but in a huge industrial process, it is very hard, if not impossible to wash away ALL traces of another chemical used.

That is why, for example, trucks which are used to transport milk are NEVER used to transport gasoline... and then milk again.