This article was first published in The Montreal Gazette.
“Three thousand six hundred food packaging chemicals detected in human bodies: How reheating food is killing us.”
That was the headline that greeted me last week from one of the news services to which I subscribe. There were many others in the same vein. I knew that a slew of emails from worried people would follow wanting to know what to make of this. After all, nobody wants their obituary to state “killed by reheating food.”
The actual title of the paper published in the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology was “Evidence for widespread human exposure to food contact chemicals.”
It is no secret that our food and beverages meet up with numerous “food contact materials” before they contact our lips. During production they can pass through plastic or metal pipes and encounter various types of processing machinery, ranging from slicers and dicers to conveyor belts. They are then packaged in glass, paper, plastic or metal containers that feature an assortment of inks and adhesives.
Food contact materials themselves have to be produced, and that involves a very large number of chemicals. When it comes to plastics, the different varieties are made from different chemicals and use different plasticizers, stabilizers, catalysts and preservatives. There are remnants of the monomers used to make the polymers as well as various polymer degradation products. Paper production involves about 200 different chemicals such as pigments, bleaching agents and coatings.
Around 14,000 chemicals have been found to be present in food contact materials. That this can be determined is a testimonial to the talents of analytical chemists and the manufacturers of their instruments. There is no question that some of these chemicals can migrate into foods and beverages. However, it must be remembered that the presence of a chemical cannot be equated to the presence of risk.
Some of these food contact chemicals have been studied in terms of their potential toxicity. For example, aluminum, bisphenol A, phthalates and perfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) have been investigated for possible carcinogenic-, endocrine- and metabolism-disrupting effects with some disturbing results. But these studies have mostly used cell cultures and animals. Human epidemiological studies have also associated some of these chemicals with medical conditions, but, of course, association is not the same as causation.
Knowing that 14,000 chemicals may be present in food contact materials is one thing, but it is the number that end up in our body that is of interest. That’s the question that the authors of the paper that generated the headlines tackled. They scrutinized five biomonitoring programs that had analyzed blood and urine samples from thousands of people for a range of chemicals, and also examined worldwide databases that have compiled data from a variety of studies investigating human exposure to potential toxins. In all, 3,600 food contact chemicals were identified as having been detected in human bodies and about 150 of these are judged to be of concern based on cell culture and animal data.
What are we to make of this? I just don’t know. We are exposed on a regular basis to thousands and thousands of chemicals from personal-care products, cleaning agents, air pollutants, medications, food and water. A classic example is coffee with more than 1,000 compounds present, including carcinogens such as acrylamide, furfural and benzopyrene, yet coffee does not cause cancer. Even with carcinogens, dose matters.
Besides these food contact chemicals invading our body, there are so many other things to worry about. Arsenic in rice? How about phthalates? They are in our shower curtains, nail polish and our children’s PVC duckies? How about sodium lauryl sulphate in shampoos? Mercury in our dental fillings? Or in fish? Mycotoxins in cereal? E. coli in meat? Listeria in cold cuts? Salmonella in eggs? Parabens in cosmetics? Or siloxanes? Lead in lipstick? Antimony in our bottled water? Gluten in wheat? Estrogens in soy? Hormones in milk? Benzopyrenes in steak? Acrylamide in potato chips? Pesticide residues on fruit? Formaldehyde outgassing from wrinkle-free shirts? Or from particle board kitchen cabinets?
If that isn’t enough, we can worry about aluminum in antiperspirants and perchloroethylene residues in dry-cleaned clothes. Then there are the flame retardants from our couch that accost us as we watch television, which floods us with a variety of programs about all the toxins in our life. We can also worry about artificial sweeteners and flavours. And let’s not forget food dyes or monosodium glutamate. Paradichlorobenzene in urinal cakes? Hexane in our cooking oil? Volatile organic chemicals in paint? Antibiotics in meat? Bisphenol A in cash register receipts? Or in white dental fillings?
There’s more. Titanium dioxide nanoparticles in sun protection products. UV exposure if we don’t use sun protection products. High fructose corn syrup. Diesel fumes. Diacetyl in popcorn flavouring. Aflatoxins on peanuts. Cobalt and chromium leaching from medical implants. PCBs in window caulking. Caramel in colas. Paraphenylenediamine in hair dyes. Chlorine in baby carrots. Petrolatum in skin, lip and hair products. Artificial musk in fragrances. Butylated hydroxyl toluene in makeup. Prescription drugs in tap water. Carcinogens oozing from crumb rubber in artificial turf. Nonoxynol in detergents. Brominated vegetable oil in beverages. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in driveway sealants. Methylene chloride in paint stripper. Acrylonitrile in synthetic fabrics. Dioxane in bubble bath. If all of this drives you to drink, well reconsider, because ethanol is a known carcinogen.
What’s the point? There are scientific papers published about all these concerns, often prompting alarmist headlines. The fact is that we are exposed to a vast array of potential toxins in various combinations, and it is essentially impossible to know what effects they have in the doses to which we are exposed. Of course, efforts should be made to reduce exposure to substances like bisphenol A, phthalates and pesticides that have a toxic cloud hanging over their heads. But this needs to be addressed at the manufacturing level. Consumers can drive themselves crazy by trying to avoid “toxins” and the associated stress is certainly detrimental to health.
As far as “reheating food killing us” goes, there is no mention of any such thing in the paper about food contact chemicals. The headline writer probably remembered something about chemicals leeching out from plastics in the microwave. Indeed, it is good advice to use glass or ceramic in the microwave, but suggesting that “reheating food” precipitates an appointment with the Grim Reaper is alarmist nonsense.
