Ten years after Chai Vang shot eight hunters in northern Wisconsin, the piece revisits the state's chronic wasting disease scare. Officials said venison was safe if hunters avoided brain, spinal cord and lymph nodes, but two medical reports raised doubts and hunters feared cross-contamination.
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Watch-List
Foods and ingredients worth a closer look, from our long-running Watch List.
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Watch-List
Red meat linked to stomach cancer
A meta-analysis of 18 studies covering 1,228,327 people found those eating the most red meat were 37 percent more likely to be diagnosed with stomach cancer than those eating the least. No trial has shown cause, but the author lists mechanisms including heme iron, nitrites and cooking carcinogens.
Watch-List
Trans fat linked to obesity, type 2 diabetes mellitus
Wake Forest researchers fed 42 male monkeys trans fat at about 8 percent of energy for six years on calorie-controlled diets; the animals gained weight, added abdominal fat and metabolised glucose worse. The authors suggest trans fat may raise obesity and type 2 diabetes risk.
Watch-List
Fried, baked foods may boost risk of lymphatic cancers
In the Netherlands Cohort Study, 10 micrograms of dietary acrylamide a day was associated with 14 percent higher multiple myeloma risk and 28 percent higher follicular lymphoma risk in men over 16 years, and with no raised risk in women. The authors call for more research.
Watch-List
Fructose, high fructose corn syrup may increase cardiovascular risk
In a UC Davis study of 48 adults, 24-hour triglycerides, LDL cholesterol and apolipoprotein B rose among those drawing 25 percent of energy from fructose or high fructose corn syrup, but not from glucose. The authors suggest this may raise cardiovascular disease risk.
Watch-List
FDA: Fluoride Supplements Never Found Safe or Effective
A fluoridation opposition group notes that National Library of Medicine drug information now warns sodium fluoride 'has not been found by FDA to be safe and effective,' and cites reviews tying supplements to higher dental fluorosis risk with no benefit to primary teeth.
Watch-List
This Company Spends Over $5M a Year to Lobby U.S. Government to Make You Sick
Disclosure reports show Monsanto spent $1.4 million lobbying the federal government in the first quarter of 2011, down from $2.5 million a year earlier, mainly targeting Congress and the USDA over rules affecting genetically engineered crops such as Roundup Ready soybeans and alfalfa.
Watch-List
Eating Foods Laced with this Common Ingredient? It Could be Slowly and Silently Harming You
Mice exposed to aspartame from 12 days' gestation until death showed significantly more liver and lung cancer at autopsy, according to a study in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine whose authors say it confirms aspartame as a multi-site carcinogen in rodents.
Watch-List
Nearly Half of U.S. Meat Tainted With Drug-Resistant Bacteria
A study of 136 meat and poultry samples from 80 brands across 26 US grocery stores found 47% carried antibiotic-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, and more than half of those bacteria resisted at least three classes of antibiotics.
Watch-List
NEW! Self-Funded Study Found HUGE Tumors from This Everyday Food...
Victoria Inness-Brown spent two and a half years feeding rats aspartame at levels comparable to diet soda and photographing the tumours she found, work she published as a book. Dr. Mercola presents her private experiment in an interview.
Watch-List
Is Beef At Risk of Mad Cow Disease Again?
The Waco Tribune-Herald reports two Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease cases in McLennan County, Texas; state data list 144 cases since 2000, 42 of them in clusters. Martha Rosenberg sets that against the 2005 Texas BSE cow and downer cattle that slipped into the food supply.
Watch-List
GE Salmon? Are You Out of Your Minds?!
Jeffrey Smith attacks the FDA's review of AquaBounty's fast-growing genetically engineered salmon, arguing the fish might carry more IGF-1, antibiotics and allergens, and likening the review to the agency's approval of GE bovine growth hormone. He asks readers to sign petitions against it.
Watch-List
Is Meat and Milk From Clones in the Food Supply?
Asked whether cloned cattle or their offspring have reached the North American food supply, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said he did not know. USDA says it is unaware of clone products entering the supply under a voluntary moratorium, but that clone offspring fall outside that moratorium.
Watch-List
Which Infant Formulas Contain Hidden Toxic Chemicals?
CDC researchers found perchlorate, a thyroid-affecting rocket fuel chemical, in 15 brands of powdered infant formula; the two most contaminated held 87 percent of the 2000 US market. The study named no brands, but Mother Jones identified them as Similac and Enfamil.
Watch-List
Beware: 'Gluten-Free' Foods are Often Contaminated
Researchers tested 22 naturally gluten-free grains, seeds and flours carrying no gluten-free label and found seven would fail the FDA's gluten-free test, including a soy flour at almost 3,000 parts per million. They attribute the traces to crops grown or processed near gluten grains.
Watch-List
New Warning About Excessive “Agent Orange” Toxin in Baby Formula and Breast Milk
Dr. Mercola writes that as the EPA reviews a proposed safe exposure limit for dioxin, research indicates a nursing infant takes in 77 times that amount and adults 1,200 times. Dioxin is a byproduct of incineration, smelting, chlorine bleaching and pesticide making, and builds up in animal fat.
Watch-List
Chicken McNuggets Contain Disturbing Additives
McDonald's China calls the additives in its chicken McNuggets harmless and compliant with Chinese standards, though a nutritionist quoted by Bloomberg calls tertiary butylhydroquinone toxic to some extent. US nuggets contain TBHQ and the anti-foaming agent dimethylpolysiloxane too.
Watch-List
Warning: Toxic Glue Used in Supermarket Food Packaging Poses Serious Health Risk
Researchers examined four acrylic adhesives used on food labels and 11 of their compounds; four seeped through the packaging and one fell in the highest toxicity category. Mercola argues these label chemicals, like BPA and phthalates from plastic, may reach food at levels worth worrying about.
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