Newsletter #33: 🥤 The FDA is not adequately protecting us from toxic food
Welcome back!
History was made TODAY
If you haven’t seen it yet, check out the replay of TODAY’S incredible protest led by Vani Hari at Kellogg’s Headquarters in Battle Creek Michigan. Vani and innumerable supporters delivered 417,000 signatures asking Kellogg’s to remove artificial food dyes and damaging ingredients like BHT from their cereals (which they promised to do in 2018, and haven’t).
The largest grassroots action on food ingredients in US history 👏
These food dyes - like Red 40 - are causing attention disorders in children, are linked to cancer, and over 92 million boxes of artificially colored Froot Loops are sold each year ALONE. BHT (butylated hydroxytoluene), a preservative, is banned in Europe in food and has been found to be toxic in animals, may cause liver, thyroid and kidney, and lung problems, can act as a tumor promoter, and may mimic estrogen. Kellogg’s does not include these ingredients in the Froot Loops they sell in Europe and other countries, because these countries have stricter standards. They uniquely include them in the American version, and American children are uniquely sicker than kids in other countries.
Today, Kellogg’s refused to meet with the peaceful protestors and Vani. In fact, a Kellogg’s employee held up a sign from indoors saying “get off our grass” to a lawn full of moms, dads, children, and concerned citizens.
I urge you to boycott ALL Kellogg’s products, and generally stop buying any sweetened cereal for kids. Cereal is dessert, not breakfast. You can watch the speeches from today’s event (which brought me to tears) on The High Wire and on Vani Hari’s instagram. Speakers included Vani, pediatricians, dentists, functional medicine doctors, cancer nutritionist, food advocates, parents, kids (!) and more.
Heroes
Heroes
For this newsletter, I’m sharing a story of how screwed up and tricky our food system is to navigate, and why eating real, unprocessed, organic food that we prepare at home is the way to go for the vast majority of our meals…
🍔 We are not being protected from toxic food - we must protect ourselves
When I was in Austin to film Joe Rogan two weeks ago, my brother and I went to a very nice steakhouse, called Dean’s, to celebrate. It had 4.9 stars on Google Reviews. You’d expect the food and drinks to be high quality, right?
Not a cheap place! You’d think the food and drinks would be safe.
🍸️ I ordered a Mocktail, a “NA-groni.” It looked delicious. I was excited!
The ingredients from the menu in my mocktail
Given the quality of this restaurant, I assumed I wouldn’t be served toxic ingredients.
I was wrong.
After I drank the drink, I started to feel “off.” I eat almost 100% clean, unprocessed, organic food I cook from scratch, so I’m quite sensitive to how I feel when I eat non-home cooked food. I noticed toward the end of dinner I was feeling a tiny bit fidgety and anxious. I immediately asked for a menu and looked at what was in the drink, and started looking up the individual ingredients of the components of the drink.
Seedlip Garden ingredients:
Seedlip’s ingredients - not great.
2. Giffard Aperitif:
Huh, what is E129?
I was curious about what this “E129” that I was ingesting was. I googled it at the table.
Of course, E129 is just another name for Red-40, the exact same ingredient Vani and team were protesting against today in Battle Creek!
E129 is just another name for Red 40, the chemical that is known to cause attention issues and ADHD, and is linked to cancer. This is the exact same chemical that food activist Vani Hari and others are raising the alarm on TODAY in Michigan!
What do we know about Red 40? First, it is linked to DNA damage and gut inflammation 👇️
Second, is linked to behavioral issues in kids 👇️
Third, it contains cancer causing chemicals, including benzene 👇️
This is so disappointing. Why does it have to be like this? Why do we have to be so vigilant in the US against sneaky toxins in our food? Why isn’t the FDA protecting us?
We shouldn’t stress ourselves out endlessly about these things, but we should be aware of what’s going on.
I share more about this in a clip from my Joe Rogan episode:
Today, there are more than 10,000 chemicals in our food. Most of these are not adequately regulated for safety.
10,000!
If you want to be SHOCKED, take a look at this list on the FDA’s website of nearly 4,000 chemicals that are allowed in our food: READ LIST HERE. This is just insanity. A quick look and you see a lot of things we should never want to eat:
Benzene: Benzene is cancer causing substance used in the production of plastics, resins, synthetic fibers, lubricants, dyes, detergents, pesticides, and drugs, and added to gasoline
Acetone: Acetone is commonly used as a solvent to manufacture plastics and other industrial products and is a nail polish remover.
Castoreum: An oily, viscid glandular secretion contained in two pairs of membranous sacs between the anus and external genitals of both sexes of beaver. Used as a “natural flavor.”
Carmine: Carminic acid, typically 17–24% of dried insects' weight, can be extracted from the body and eggs of insects, then mixed with aluminum or calcium salts to make carmine dye, also known as cochineal. Today, carmine is primarily used as a colorant in food and in lipstick (E120 or Natural Red 4).
A screenshot from the FDA’s approved food additive list…
And remember, when you are eating foods that contain “natural flavors” (which seem to be in so many foods today), you are exposing yourself to innumerable other chemicals. The only requirement for “natural flavors” is that they meet this criteria, which is unbelievably broad. What this means is that we can eat something with “natural flavors” and be eating one of thousands of chemicals as long as it was derived from something that was once found in nature.
From the FDA website
So what to do about all this?
It’s pretty simple. Simply, but not easy. Buy, grow, cook and eat organic fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, meats, eggs, dairy, beans, legumes, and spices, ideally from farmers you know, ideally fresh. Shop at the farmer’s market as much as you can. Prioritize real food. You got this.
With good energy 💓
Dr. Casey
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