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Report Finds PFAS Chemicals In One-Third of Fast Food Packaging (cnn.com)
dryriver quotes CNN:
Most of the time, when you order fast food, you know exactly what you're getting: an inexpensive meal that tastes great but is probably loaded with fat, cholesterol and sodium. But it turns out that the packaging your food comes in could also have a negative impact on your health, according to a report published Wednesday in the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters. The report found fluorinated chemicals in one-third of the fast food packaging researchers tested.
These chemicals are favored for their grease-repellent properties. Along with their use in the fast food industry, fluorinated chemicals -- sometimes called PFASs -- are used "to give water-repellant, stain-resistant, and non-stick properties to consumer products such as furniture, carpets, outdoor gear, clothing, cosmetics (and) cookware," according to a news release that accompanied the report. "The most studied of these substances (PFOSs and PFOAs) has been linked to kidney and testicular cancer, elevated cholesterol, decreased fertility, thyroid problems and changes in hormone functioning, as well as adverse developmental effects and decreased immune response in children."
The chemicals can migrate into your food, says one of the study's authors, who suggests removing it from the packaging as quickly as possible. (You might also request your french fries in a paper cup, which are free from "chemicals of concern".) But they also suggest pressuring fast food chains to remove the chemicals from their packaging, and the president of the Foodservice Packaging Institute acknowledges that after the study concluded in 2015, fluorochemical-free packaging was introduced.
These chemicals are favored for their grease-repellent properties. Along with their use in the fast food industry, fluorinated chemicals -- sometimes called PFASs -- are used "to give water-repellant, stain-resistant, and non-stick properties to consumer products such as furniture, carpets, outdoor gear, clothing, cosmetics (and) cookware," according to a news release that accompanied the report. "The most studied of these substances (PFOSs and PFOAs) has been linked to kidney and testicular cancer, elevated cholesterol, decreased fertility, thyroid problems and changes in hormone functioning, as well as adverse developmental effects and decreased immune response in children."
The chemicals can migrate into your food, says one of the study's authors, who suggests removing it from the packaging as quickly as possible. (You might also request your french fries in a paper cup, which are free from "chemicals of concern".) But they also suggest pressuring fast food chains to remove the chemicals from their packaging, and the president of the Foodservice Packaging Institute acknowledges that after the study concluded in 2015, fluorochemical-free packaging was introduced.
It's really terrible for you. You should eat a vegetable-based diet and if you really think you need some type of meat try a lean wild-caught salmon -- but you should try to avoid meat entirely and go 100% veg.
The most studied of these substances has been linked....
As usual, the key information to know the extent of the potential problem is missing. So, we know that there is a study out there that shows a possible link between one of these substances and health problems.
How much exposure required to show a link? What is the elevation in risk for common intake from packaging? How much of the studied substance is actually in use vs other substances?
There hardly appears to be enough information to make any recommendations.
"The chemicals can migrate into your food, says one of the study's authors, who suggests removing it from the packaging."
Just remove the shitty food from your diet as quick as possible.
I doubt any well educated person overlooks the health risks associated with eating fast foods.
Just keep it to a minimum or cut it out completely.
If anyone's so concerned, why are you eating fast-food in the first place?
Sounds to me like if you're not concerned about that, then you'll be ok as long as you don't eat the packaging.
What's inside the plastic wrapping is going to kill you quicker than whatever the wrapping is made of.
Or, otherwise, we'd pretty much all be dead by now.
Sure, start phasing it out, like thousands of things before it, but it's not an end-of-the-world, evil-fast-food-chain, profiteering-bastards kind of story at all.
Hell, I remember when McDonald's burgers came in a polystyrene box. They changed that and it's now a card-thing with shiny outside. I'm sure those things were always marked as "food-safe" or they'd have been in court a million times by now because of it.
But our idea of food-safe changes as knowledge increases. I wouldn't be surprised if we ended up going back to polystyrene boxes at some point, we're bound to find out that something older and abandoned actually wasn't all that bad or we can now make it without it being bad.
But the tone of the summary/story is quite heavily in the "OH MY GOD WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE" section. When actually the story is more like "Huh, there's a tiny chance this could very slightly statistically be worse for you that paper. Oh well, let's change that, but it's not worth panicking and trying to do that overnight. Let's just phase it out for something slightly better."
Hell, they banned fish and chip shops in the UK from using newspaper for wrapping the food in, which they always did in my father's day, because of the ink in the paper being not ideal to wrap a greasy load of fried fish and potato into. But try and point to someone who died or was taken ill as a result and you'd be hard pressed to come up with anything at all.
And then, ironically, they all started using polystyrene and plastics, which we're now telling them are bad for the environment and they should go back to paper, and recycled paper at that...
No worries. Trump will just sign an executive order removing all regulations. At a result these chemicals will then be safe for consumption.
Trump4life!
45 years after burying PVC piping all over my yard, I dug some up. Clean and shiny as the day I'd purchased it. When I planted that pipe, the code required anti backflow valves under someone's theory that my water main pressure might drop (it never did) and garden irrigation water might flow back and pollute my household water. What a total farce!
Inform me of the risks.
Let me choose to patronize restaurants that give me safer-to-eat food or food in packaging that is less likely to leak grease or mayo through the wrapper.
If enough people demand safe-to-eat food, the other packaging will disappear.
If enough people demand water-and-grease-repellant packaging, the other kind will disappear.
In general, the market decide.
I'm willing to budge and go "nanny state" when it comes to food marketed towards minors and food that is sold in "captive/concession-controlled" environments where the customer's choices are very limited. Yes, movie theaters and sports stadiums and airports, I'm looking at you.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
If you expected any better from these mega-food corporations then you've set yourself up for disappointment.
For my part, I'll gradually reduce the packaging material I eat. By the end of March of this year I hope to maintain a 20% reduction. Assuming no serious withdrawal symptoms, I may cut consumption of packaging material in half by the end of the year. Wish me luck!
...omphaloskepsis often...
As we move into the era of 'less regulation', what difference does it make, nothing will be done about it.
that tastes great
It tastes OK.
If you're eating at fast food restaurants you're not worried about your health, so this is truly a non-story.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
For nearly 40 years, the food industry—with the government's help—has misinformed the public by claiming fat* and cholesterol** are unhealthy. As a result, obesity, diabetes, pre-diabetes, metabolic syndrome and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease are now rampant. A third of U.S. healthcare costs are attributable to weight-related conditions. For most people, there's nothing wrong with fat and cholesterol in our food—even saturated fat is not unhealthy in moderation. It's the carbohydrates people eat and drink. In the U.S. people eat far too many carbohydrates... with little/no fiber to moderate its update—high glycemic index foods. The majority of people would benefit from eating a low-carbohydrate, high-fat (LCHF) diet instead. The people with the highest saturated fat levels in their blood stream are those who eat carbs.
Dietary salt is generally not as dangerous as it has been made out to be either, with a 2014 study having shown that the lowest incidence of cardiovascular events and death by any cause is associated with dietary intake of sodium twice as high as government guidelines (4-6 grams per day vs. 2-3 grams per day).
See "The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living" (2011) for further information.
*Yes, trans-fatty acids are terribly unhealthy, but they're an unnatural creation and have largely been eliminated from the food supply thanks to the government.
**Cholesterol consumed in moderation is not unhealthy, as your body will synthesize cholesterol on its own if too little is consumed. There are also good cholesterol (HDL) and bad cholesterol (LDL), as well as good LDL (buoyant) and bad LDL (dense). People eating a LCHF diet tend to have high HDL and good LDL.
Fuck Donald Trump
One must have severely damaged taste-buds to consider that fast food tastes even remotely '0K'. ...
If you are used drinking water, eating fresh, lightly seasoned, food (home made, or from a good restaurant),
then fast-food tastes like mouth-burning salty/acidic sponge (or sole, depending on the "meal").
Of course, if one is used to fast-food and sodas then water and proper food is probably taste-less : after all, one gets used to pain.
Irrelevant news and morons using moderation to mod down what they disagree on. 2018 resolution: so long.
Can the USDA food chart be correct if half of the country is obese? Not overweight, obese?
Own up, who has been wiping used hamburger wrappers on their testicles? You have no-one to blame but yourselves.
One major flaw I saw with the study is that the samples collected from the stores were wrapped in aluminum foil then sent for analysis; however analytical testing labs will tell you this is frowned upon because PFOS are used in coatings on many aluminum foil manufacturers. I am definitely not an advocate for these chemicals in any application but unless the source of foil can.be.comfirmed PFOS-free and used uniformly throughout the study a source of bias is possible in the results.
Apparently thermal paper has free form Bisphenol A which is also an endocrine disrupter. It is far worse as it is in free form, so.... wash your hands after handling those shopping receipts!!!!
From the original source: "Most of the time, when you order fast food, you know exactly what you're getting: an inexpensive meal that tastes great..."
I am very skeptical about these three assertions:
1. "you know exactly what you're getting..."
Do you really know if say, the salad dressing is 100% olive oil, soy oil, or none of the above? Or that thiamine, or anti- caking chemicals are added to the hamburger bum?
2. "an inexpensive meal." Fast food chains around me for many years have been doing a great job of raising the price of a meal from $5 toward $12 by addition and upgrades. Okay, you can buy a meal in some of those chains for under $5. But, adding cheese, supersize, bacon, drink or something more substantial than a wimpy hamburger and the price goes up. This is actually good because it leaves the only reason to buy food there is that it is fast.
2. "...an inexpensive meal that tastes great..."
Anyone paying any attention can research and find that a lot of fast food is high in salt, sugar, and may contain "flavor enhancers" (my term, unless it has been used before) such as mono-sodium glutamate. I typically eat a mix of home cooked, fast food a few times a week, and fairly okay small local restaurant food.
Sometimes though, I will shift to a strict healthier eating plan such as The DASH* diet: a lot of vegetables and fruit, little or near zero added salt and sugar, most meals prepared at home from single ingredients that I mix and add together, no microwave meals, not even health food microwave meals. After 10 days or two weeks of eating this way, when I go back to fast food I find the food tastes mostly pretty bad if not horrible.
Reason one: salt levels and sugar levels are very high in some fast food and restaurant food. After strict eating for 2 weeks, I find it does not taste good. Some salty foods are so salty it burns and is painful.
Flavors in fast food and lower end chain restaurants are overwhelmed by sweet and salt, are muted, lack variety and subtlety.
Common explanations, which probably could be researched better:
1. salt, sugar and flavor enhancers such as MSG create behavior similar to addiction--you want more and more,
2. Tolerance, the phenomena in addicting drugs where the same dose becomes less effective as you continue to use it. By 'going off' for a period of time, tolerance, the sensitivity to your pleasure center to opiods or your taste buds (or taste buds plus brain circuits) are "reset." Then you go back and eat some fast food and your re-set taste buds conclude it doesn't taste that good.
Comment: "Food addiction" is only a partial fit. I may think cutting out chocolate will kill me, but I'll go out on a limb and say, no, it won't. No, I don't have any studies with evidence on that point, eh?
Also, if you eat simpler food with less salt, sugar, and who knows what, your appreciation and sensitivity to the taste of simple foods may increase. I'll say it it is highly probable it will.
One disturbing aspect of this process is, after eating strict for a few weeks when going back to fast fast food, your more discerning sense of taste reveals salt in things like ice cream or sugar in things like french fries and hamburgers. What are they doing there?
*http://dashdiet.org/default.asp
I put that link in just in case someone wants to rant and rave against it, I suggest if you are unfamiliar with it that you read what it actually is first.
This post makes no comments on GMO, organic, meat/vegetarian, paleo, vitamins, dihydrogen monoxide.
If you reply to this post, take note of that.
All the fast food chains around here had already switched to paper years ago... where is this actually still a problem? Which types of packages/materials are actually still being used that even require a non-stick coating, and which actual restaurant chains are still using them?