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FDA and European regulators in information sharing agreement on food

Byoliveridley

Good, I guess. The Europeans demand a lot of testing on their food, and if they can share information with the FDA on general trends, and even specific batches of food ingredients, the FDa gets a lot of information without having to setup any kind of infrastructure, or have manufacturers scream at them for insisting they perform tests they’re already performing for the European market!

In regulation, the strictest one eventually wins as long as it has enough of a market that it cannot be boycotted/ignored.

FDA inks deal with Europeans over food safety | Health | Reuters

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Monday it signed a pact with European regulators to share more information about the safety of the food supply.

The FDA said the agreement with the European Food Safety Authority would pave the way for formally sharing confidential scientific information and that it would help protect confidential information under both regions’ laws.

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    March Babies not so Bright? – Pesticides to Blame?

    Byoliveridley

    An Indiana scientist makes a rather provocative argument that exposure to pesticides in the womb can explain why Indiana babies conceived in July-August (Born March and April?) have lower achievement scores than the other kids.

    ScienceDaily: Conception Date Affects Babys Future Academic Achievement

    Dr. Winchester and colleagues linked the scores of the students in grades 3 through 10 who took the Indiana Statewide Testing for Educational Progress (ISTEP) examination with the month in which each student had been conceived. The researchers found that ISTEP scores for math and language were distinctly seasonal with the lowest scores received by children who had been conceived in June through August.

    “The fetal brain begins developing soon after conception. The pesticides we use to control pests in fields and our homes and the nitrates we use to fertilize crops and even our lawns are at their highest level in the summer,” said Dr. Winchester, who also directs Newborn Intensive Care Services at St. Francis Hospital in Indianapolis.

    “Exposure to pesticides and nitrates can alter the hormonal milieu of the pregnant mother and the developing fetal brain,” said Dr. Winchester. “While our findings do not represent absolute proof that pesticides and nitrates contribute to lower ISTEP scores, they strongly support such a hypothesis.”

    Well, that is a bold leap of faith, and use of a correlation=causation argument that I don’t appreciate in most cases. Has this kind of work been done in other countries, or in urban environments without pesticide use?

    I am sure that many chemicals have subtle, but significant effects on developing fetuses. And the chemicals the authors mention have links with hypothyroidism..

    Nitrates and pesticides are known to cause maternal hypothyroidism and lower maternal thyroid in pregnancy is associated with lower cognitive scores in offspring.

    There is a link, but without further data, I think the conclusions are a stretch. But, something to keep in mind I guess if you live in Indiana and want to plan a baby!

    Disclaimer: I was conceived in June, and was in the upper echelons of achievement through school. So, by the power of personal experience, I am predisposed to scepticism. OTH, I grew up in a big city with consistently high pollution levels throughout the year and not much pesticide exposure.

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    Asbestos stays off global dangerous-substance list

    Byoliveridley

    NDP MP Pat Martin said Tuesday the Canadian delegation did not even participate in the discussions this year but got others to work on their behalf instead.

    He accused the Canadians of browbeating developing nations such as India, Pakistan and Vietnam — some of Canada's largest chrysotile customers — into opposing its inclusion on the list.

    "It's not a proud day for our country," said Martin, who attended the convention and spoke by telephone from Rome.

    via Chrysotile asbestos stays off global dangerous-substance list

    Canadians can now breathe easy. The government did not even have to oppose a notification officially, other countries did it for them.

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    Feds punt on Bisphenol A

    Byoliveridley

    By studiously ignoring all the subtle hormone disruption effects of bisphenol A and concentrating on easily observable neurological effects, the CERHR essentially does the industry’s bidding.

    Some risk linked to plastic chemical – Los Angeles Times

    A federal panel of scientists concluded Wednesday that an estrogen-like compound in plastic could be posing some risk to the brain development of babies and children.

    Bisphenol A, or BPA, is found in low levels in virtually every human body. A component of polycarbonate plastic, it can leach from baby bottles and other hard plastic beverage containers, food can linings and other consumer products.

    Culminating months of scientific debate, the decision by the 12 advisors of the Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction — part of the National Institutes of Health — is the first official, government action related to the chemical. Their recommendation will be reviewed for a federal report that could lead to regulations restricting one of the most used chemicals.

    The scientists ranked their concerns about BPA, concluding they had “some concern” about neurological and behavioral effects in fetuses, infants and children, but “minimal” or “negligible” concern about reproductive effects. The findings put the panel roughly in the middle — between the chemical industry, which has long said there is no evidence of danger to humans, and the environmental activists and scientists who say it is probably harming people.

    For a detailed look at how bisphenol research has been corrupted by industry sponsored “focused counter research” – where the goal is to show no effects and the experiment is tiled to ensure this goal, read this excellent article in the The Public Library of Science Biology Open Source Journal. Note, because it is Open Access, you can actually read it without selling a kidney! Some highlights…

    The moment we published something on bisphenol A, the chemical industry went out and hired a number of corporate laboratories to replicate our research. What was stunning about what they did,” vom Saal says with a mix of outrage and bemused disbelief, “was they hired people who had no idea how to do the work. Each of the members of these groups came to me and said, ‘We don’t know how to do this, will you teach us?’”

    More…

    The HCRA report, commissioned before Schwartz’s tenure, concluded that “the weight of the evidence for low-dose effects is very weak” [15]. Industry groups hailed the report as a comprehensive review by independent experts and quickly disseminated its findings. Yet the “comprehensive” report reviewed just 19 of 47 studies available in April 2002, and when it was published more than two years later, three panelists asked not to be listed as authors.

    What the hell, just read the whole article, especially the bit about the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis and its well documented industry shillness.

    The key to understanding bisphenol research is to realize that it is a hormone disruptor that works at low doses. At high doses, normal toxicological testing doses that is, it floods the hormone receptors and slows down the receptor pathways. So, the usual technique of testing in rats and mice at high doses and extrapolating will not work.

  • Melamine – Very Routine in Animal Feed

    Byoliveridley

    Filler in Animal Feed Is Open Secret in China – New York Times

    As American food safety regulators head to China to investigate how a chemical made from coal found its way into pet food that killed dogs and cats in the United States, workers in this heavily polluted northern city openly admit that the substance is routinely added to animal feed as a fake protein.For years, producers of animal feed all over China have secretly supplemented their feed with the substance, called melamine, a cheap additive that looks like protein in tests, even though it does not provide any nutritional benefits, according to melamine scrap traders and agricultural workers here.

    Wow, apparently, this has been going for a while now, and is extremely widespread.

    It is time to test everything protein supplement coming out of China for Melamine, not just wheat gluten as the FDA has been doing. More importantly, it is also time to investigate other possible “additives” that Chinese (or for that matter, any other country including the US) manufacturers may be using.

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    Melamine Adulteration investigation gets cracking

    Byoliveridley

    FDA agents raid pet food plant, offices – Yahoo! News

    WASHINGTON – Federal agents searched facilities of a dog and cat food manufacturer and one of its suppliers as part of an investigation into the widening recall of pet products, the companies disclosed Friday. Food and Drug Administration officials searched an Emporia, Kan., pet food plant operated by Menu Foods and the Las Vegas offices of ChemNutra Inc., according to the companies. Menu Foods made many of the more than 100 brands of pet food recalled since March 16 because of contamination by the chemical melamine. ChemNutra supplied the manufacturer with wheat gluten, one of the two ingredients tainted by melamine used in recalled pet products. Both companies said they were cooperating with the investigation.

    The initial “let’s blame China for everything” drumbeat is subsiding a little as the FDA finally begins its inspections, and we find the tangled web of the food import business unraveling just a little bit. At this point in time, the charges are flying like crazy.

    The origin within China of the wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate remains murky. For example, ChemNutra’s source for the twovegetable proteins, Suzhou Textile Import and Export Co., told The AP that food ingredients aren’t part of its business — but that employees often take on side deals. Stern said ChemNutra dealt with the company’s president.

    Side deals? How quaint? The solution is simple: Quarantine every food item from China until it has been tested for melamine. You do not know the extent of the problem yet. It only seems to get worse everyday. Make the manufacturers pay for the testing.  Tighten up the paperwork, exercise tighter control over where the ingredients come from, get everything in writing.

    Meanwhile, the manufacturers are getting their press releases out. From Blue Buffalo foods…

    We at the Blue Buffalo Company have just learned that American Nutrition Inc. (ANI), the manufacturer of all our cans and biscuits, has been adding rice protein concentrate to our can formulas without our knowledge and without our approval. This is product tampering, and it apparently has been going on for some time. The can formulas that we developed, and trusted them to produce, never contained any rice protein concentrate. It appears that only an FDA investigation of ANI’s rice protein concentrate supplies forced them to reveal this product tampering to us.

    While this activity by ANI is in itself unlawful, the situation is further clouded by the fact that ANI has been receiving rice protein concentrate from Wilber-Ellis, some of which the FDA has determined to be contaminated with melamine.

    If this is true (and we don’t know that for a fact), it’s plain ol’ cheating and food adulteration. What does American Nutrition have to say?

    The FDA has urged American Nutrition to issue a voluntary recall of pet foods manufactured using Wilbur-Ellis rice protein. None of these products is sold under an American Nutrition brand, but are sold through other independent companies. No American Nutrition brands or other products they manufacture for other businesses are affected by this recall.

    Why would I trust the word of anyone who’s accused of adding ingredients off the label? This story gets curiouser and curiouser, and it is pretty clear that between the “side dealers” in China and some greedy middlemen suppliers here, we have plenty of blame to go around.

    Stay tuned for more…

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    Health Canada report ties asbestos to lung cancer

    Byoliveridley

    Health Canada sat for more than a year on a report by a panel of international experts that concludes there is a “strong relationship” between lung cancer and chrysotile asbestos mined in Canada.

    Health Canada received the report in March 2008, resisting calls from the panel chairman to release the findings despite his plea last fall that the delay was “an annoying piece of needless government secrecy.”

    Canwest News Service obtained the report under Access to Information legislation, but the request took more than 10 months to process.

    Vancouver Sun

    Yes, dog bites man anywhere else except Canada, which has a hard time accepting that it routinely exports products that kill people. The “annoying piece of needless government secrecy” is neither needless or annoying. It protects a dying industry with a few, powerful stakeholders in Quebec, an important swing political province, so there’s need for it! Annoying – your seat “buddy” on the bus yammering on their cellphone, cancer, well, I don’t know, you tell me!

    Expect little to change from this report. It does mention that there is little danger from “Canadian exposure levels”, conveniently forgetting that 90% of the export is to developing countries where there are fewer safeguards. This feeds into the Canadian government line that “chrysotile” is safe if used correctly. If you think this line of reasoning is familiar, it is. The tobacco industry used it routinely till recently.

    Shame.
    n