Rich Food, Poor Food<\/a>,<\/em>\u00a0authors Mira and Jason Calton provide a list of what they term \u201cBanned Bad Boys\u201d \u2014 ingredients commonly used in up to 80% of all American convenience food that have been banned by other countries, with information about which countries banned each substance and why.<\/p>\nAnd though it might not surprise you to hear that Olestra \u2014 commonly used in low\/no-fat snack foods and known to cause serious gastrointestinal issues for those who consume it (understatement) \u2014 is on that list, having been banned in both the United Kingdom and Canada, you may be shocked to hear that Mountain Dew, Fresca and Squirt all contain brominated vegetable oil, a substance that has been banned in more than 100 countries \u201cbecause it has been linked to basically every form of thyroid disease \u2014 from cancer to autoimmune diseases \u2014 known to man.\u201d<\/p>\n
Way to go,\u00a0FDA! Woot!<\/p>\n
\u00a0You might also be upset to hear that the\u00a0food coloring\u00a0used to make your kid’s delicious\u00a0Mac & Cheese\u00a0dinner visually appealing – yellow #5 and yellow #6, namely – is made from coal tar, which among other things is an active ingredient in lice shampoo and has been linked to allergies, ADHD, and cancer in animals. And gaaaaah.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Then there’s\u00a0azodicarbonamide\u00a0– commonly found in\u00a0frozen dinners\u00a0and frozen potato and bread products – which is used make things like bleach and foamed plastics like those found in yoga mats (tasty!). Azodicarbonamide has been banned in most\u00a0European countries\u00a0because it’s known to induce asthma, and is in fact deemed so dangerous that in Singapore its use carries a hefty $500,00 fine and up to 15 years in prison.<\/p>\n
Yet, according to the FDA, it’s SO TOTALLY FINE for us to keep shoveling it into our kid’s faceholes: “[Azodicarbonamide] is approved to be a bleaching agent in cereal flour and is permitted for direct addition to food for human consumption.”<\/p>\n
Oooookay then.<\/p>\n
Finally, there’s butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA) and butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT) – found in Post, Kelloggs and Quaker brand cereals – which is made from petroleum and is a known cancer-causing agent. It’s been banned in England and Japan, but those of us in the U.S. can keep right on serving up to our children for breakfast, because AMMURICA. And FREEDOMZ.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Anyone else find all of this, ohhhh I don’t know, more than a tad bit disturbing? I’m not ashamed to say I have love for the blue box\u00a0Mac & Cheese, and to think that chemicals known and recognized world-wide as completely toxic are included in that – a product openly marketed as being a meal FOR KIDS – makes me more than a little ragey. I mean, those chemicals can’t be what makes it taste so good, right? So can’t we, umm, just use something else instead? (PLEEEASE DON’T MAKE ME GIVE UP THE MAC & CHEESE, PLEEEASE.)\u00a0Sigh<\/i>.<\/p>\n
-By Tracey Gaughran-Perez<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Yahoo! Shine June 24, 2013 If you or your kids enjoy pre-packaged convenience foods\u00a0commonly found in grocery stores across the U.S. such as Froot Loops, Swanson dinners, Mountain Dew, and frozen potato and bread products, you may think twice before purchasing them after hearing what they contain: dangerous chemicals that other countries around the globe […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-44865","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44865\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}