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Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

consumerreports.org

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Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#101

Post by jiggawatts »

stephen_g wrote: post #36
doitLP wrote: post #28

I hate this. I’m up to my eyeballs trying to keep my newborn away from all the toxic shit that’s in every part of his life, BP* in plastics, flame retardants in clothes and mattresses and rugs, heavy metals in baby food and now in herbs, micro plastics in food, radioactivity and mercury in farmland around coal fired power plants, etc etc etc. The negative externalities on dangerous chemicals is so very high; what am…

I hate it too. The one thing that does make me a bit optimistic is that firstly that for quite a few of the big issues, things are gradually getting better (leaded petrol having been phased out, PBDEs are on the way out, average quantities of things like phthalates and PFOA in people's blood I believe are dropping in most places). The shift away from fossil fuels could be another massive health improvement - studies…

Obstetricians and paediatricians around the world noticed an increase in average birth weight recently. It was attributed to a combination of less pollution due to COVID lockdowns reducing traffic, and reduced stress levels because more people were working from home.

Where I live, the air seemed pretty clean before. During the height of the lockdowns it was something else. The air was so clear that you felt like you could just reach out and touch the city skyline across the harbour. It was unreal how big a difference less cars on the road made.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#102

Post by xyzzy21 »

Yes. And "earth biscuit" loved kale is a #1 concentrator of cadmium as well - it's part of it's genome as a plant. You can't completely avoid these things.

Similarly radiation is unavoidable even if we never had discovered the bomb. And with the threat a magnet pole reversal, that could become a major thing for a few 100-1000 years.

What doesn't kill you makes you and yours stronger.

Also the first part of the article about "reducing salt" - it turns out the 1950s papers on the connection between salt and cardiovascular disease is so flawed as Design of Experiment and execution that it borders on fraud.

The origin cholesterol and cardio paper has the same flaws and probably should not be taken seriously. Correlation is not causation but BAD correlation due to fundamental study flaws certainly isn't.

Add to this the "linear thinking" usually used to justify treatments and habits to change, when metabolic systems are HIGHLY nonlinear and pretty much the entire medical profession deserves a FAIL.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#103

Post by giantg2 »

HWR_14 wrote: post #71
giantg2 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, don't worry about this. We use plenty of spices and my kid's lead level was extremely low (undetectable if I remember right). They will test your kid at some point too. This, and other potential sources, are only a problem if the test shows there's a problem.

> This, and other potential sources, are only a problem if the test shows there's a problem. While true, at that point it's a problem with no good solution.

It depends. That's only true if the levels are very high (they can chetalate but it doesn't necessarily improve IQ). I also should have clarified "other sources" to be other trace sources.

The level isn't going to be that high from spices and normal food sources (even the article says it's .1% of a child's lead exposure). Unless they're eating paint chips or around lead fumes from old cars or some other high lead source, the levels will be low. While no amount of lead is necessarily good, there are threshold levels before it truly becomes bad. It's present everywhere in trace amounts.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#104

Post by jtc331 »

whatshisface wrote: post #57
bitwize wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The small stuff bioaccumulates and fucks with your endocrine system. If you have kids, one of the best things you can do for them is work towards the dismantling of Western civilization and establishment of a permaculture-based society.

The resulting decline in the number of people that can be fed at one time might not be as great for your kids.

Modern industrial agriculture actually produces far less per acre than small market gardening by hand does. The efficiency of the industrialized approach isn’t in output per acre it’s in output per person hour.

So if large numbers of people farmed by hand we’d actually be able to feed more people, but the trade off is far lower output of other industrialized goods and services.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#105

Post by quadrifoliate »

fennecfoxen wrote: post #55
quadrifoliate wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...what am I supposed to do, test my fucking pepper? I think a large part of the USA keeps electing politicians whose philosophy seems to be absolutely that – you "get the choice" to test your pepper or not, and market forces will eventually drive out the bad pepper companies. This can be backed up by the fact that one of the past administrators of the Environmental Protection Agency was a thinly veiled oil and gas…

I know there's a lot to be said about $POLITICIANS and $POLICY generally, but somehow I don't think there's any big-oil type conspiracy to prevent the FDA from checking for heavy metals in spices, specifically. Did they check for them in the more regulation-on environment of the Clinton administration? The Obama administration? Might there be more nuance than "regulations on!" "regulations off!?"

> ...somehow I don't think there's any big-oil type conspiracy to prevent the FDA from checking for heavy metals in spices, specifically

Of course there isn't, but that's also not an argument I think I made. I was indicating the more general trend towards de-regulation in the majority of the US, which likely affects all government agencies, including the FDA and the FCC (see, for example, the unchecked monopolies of most ISPs).

I think of it as a chilling effect by appointment. If you put the oil lobbyists in charge of environmental protection and a lawyer from Verizon in charge of the FCC, it seems to me that, for instance, increased FDA funding for anything, (including food safety) is not going to be the top priority of the Government.

Now, it's possible you're asserting that moves like putting oil and coal lobbyists in charge of environmental protection are somehow unique and do not indicate a general skepticism towards regulation.

I suppose there is no way to emphatically demonstrate that without waiting for a few decades, but would refer you to various surveys about political attitudes towards governmental regulation of companies.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#106

Post by ggherbo »

stephen_g wrote: post #36
doitLP wrote: post #28

I hate this. I’m up to my eyeballs trying to keep my newborn away from all the toxic shit that’s in every part of his life, BP* in plastics, flame retardants in clothes and mattresses and rugs, heavy metals in baby food and now in herbs, micro plastics in food, radioactivity and mercury in farmland around coal fired power plants, etc etc etc. The negative externalities on dangerous chemicals is so very high; what am…

I hate it too. The one thing that does make me a bit optimistic is that firstly that for quite a few of the big issues, things are gradually getting better (leaded petrol having been phased out, PBDEs are on the way out, average quantities of things like phthalates and PFOA in people's blood I believe are dropping in most places). The shift away from fossil fuels could be another massive health improvement - studies…

wow, completely missing the point. also babies and children aren't smokers so there's no equivalency.

childhood is naturally fastest growth period anything disrupting hormone balance because of these traumas can drasticaally affect the rest of the childs life. think making them a mouth breather from disrupting immune system triggering asthma or allergies. this all connected and most people don't realize how much they are hurting their kids indirectly or even directly

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#107

Post by amanaplanacanal »

birksherty wrote: post #100
doitLP wrote: post #28

I hate this. I’m up to my eyeballs trying to keep my newborn away from all the toxic shit that’s in every part of his life, BP* in plastics, flame retardants in clothes and mattresses and rugs, heavy metals in baby food and now in herbs, micro plastics in food, radioactivity and mercury in farmland around coal fired power plants, etc etc etc. The negative externalities on dangerous chemicals is so very high; what am…

Best solution is to not having kids. This is if you think for the kids first. There is no reason to have kids that is for the benefit of the potential child. But nobody likes that. People's selfish wish always comes first before the potential kid's benefit. So kids will have these toxins in their body in the end and any problem that comes with it.

Existence feels like a benefit over non-existence. But this is a philosophical problem rather than a measurement problem.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#108

Post by amanaplanacanal »

quadrifoliate wrote: post #50
doitLP wrote: post #28

I hate this. I’m up to my eyeballs trying to keep my newborn away from all the toxic shit that’s in every part of his life, BP* in plastics, flame retardants in clothes and mattresses and rugs, heavy metals in baby food and now in herbs, micro plastics in food, radioactivity and mercury in farmland around coal fired power plants, etc etc etc. The negative externalities on dangerous chemicals is so very high; what am…

> ...what am I supposed to do, test my fucking pepper? I think a large part of the USA keeps electing politicians whose philosophy seems to be absolutely that – you "get the choice" to test your pepper or not, and market forces will eventually drive out the bad pepper companies. This can be backed up by the fact that one of the past administrators of the Environmental Protection Agency was a thinly veiled oil and gas…

Thyme and oregano are easy peasy to grow at home.

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#109

Post by andrekandre »

hinkley wrote: post #76
refurb wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arsenic in rice is due to exactly that, pulling naturally occurring arsenic from the water used for irrigation.

Not the only source. American rice is grown sometimes on old cotton fields, which were sprayed with arsenic to control boll weevils. Apparently washing the rice does remove quite a bit.

washing and also soaking for several hours/overnight and/or boiling it with lots of water (and pouring it out) can greatly reduce it iirc

btw, afaik, naturally, brown rice has more has alot, basmati rice seems to have the least

https://sites.dartmouth.edu/arsenicandyou/arsenic-in-rice-an...

Re: Herbs and Spices Might Contain Arsenic, Cadmium, and Lead

#110

Post by saurik »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #84
jandrewrogers wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm pretty sure the EU has stricter food safety regulations than the US. Interestingly, the US is notable for having just about the highest food safety and quality standards in the world, and these regulations systematically block the import of many food goods into the US. Per this source [0], the US is second after Canada; other sources move the countries around a bit but the US is always right up around the top.…

I thought the US was not as good because of the conditions locally in slaughterhouses, using "pink slime" in burgers etc. Those things definitely don't fly in the EU. I read about these in "Fast Food Nation". I have a feeling the US is stricter when it comes to importing foods but not as strict with locally produced items. But I don't have a good reference of this. If I'm wrong I'm sorry.

FWIW, "pink slime" is extremely regulated and uses processes that are carefully controlled... you might consider it "gross", but that would really just be an aesthetics issues AFAIK: it isn't "unsafe" (unless you count "not very nutritious" as "unsafe" ;P).
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