Radiation nation

After sending you the e-Alert last week about irradiated beef (“Don’t Beam Me Up” 2/4/03), I came across a news item announcing that a popular supermarket chain began selling irradiated ground beef on February 2nd in six mid-Atlantic states, including Maryland, where I live. These stores are among some 4,000 nationwide that currently sell irradiated beef.

This alone would be unsettling enough. But in response to that e-Alert, I received a reply from HSI Panelist Jon Barron with additional information about the irradiation process that I guarantee will make you think twice the next time you stop off at your grocery to buy meat products.

Who let the nutrients out?

To briefly recap: Irradiation is a process by which a food product is exposed to extremely high doses of radiation to kill bacteria, parasites and funguses that may cause spoilage or disease. And if that were all irradiation did, that would be fine. But as we’ll see, there’s much more to it than that.

Jon begins by describing the process in more detail: “Food is exposed to ‘hard’ irradiation, usually gamma rays from a source like cobalt-80, in doses of 100,000 to 3,000,000 rads. To give you a sense of how high a dose this is, understand that a dose of just 10,000 rads will totally destroy any living tissue.”

As HSI Panelist Allan Spreen, M.D., made clear last week, an abundance of nutrients are also eliminated by this process. Jon agrees, and says, “as much as 70% of the Vitamin A, B1 and B2 in irradiated milk is destroyed, and about 30% of Vitamin C.” Unfortunately, irradiation also accelerates the growth of aspergillus mold, “which produces the most potent natural carcinogens known to man, called aflatoxins.”

I wish I could say that’s the worst of it – but we’re just getting started.

A radiotoxin by any other name

Processing food with the extremely high levels of gamma rays described above results in the creation of some very dangerous molecules, about which Jon gives this interesting but frightening background: “They were originally called ‘radiotoxins’ by Russian researchers. Since that word would be frightening to American consumers, the FDA came up with a couple of ‘softer’ terms. They call them ‘known radiolytic products’ to describe the molecules that are created such as formaldehyde and benzene (known carcinogens), and as for those chemical molecules created by irradiation and that have never before been seen by man, the FDA came up with the equally soft ‘unique radiolytic products.'”

Long before the FDA started assigning more palatable terms for these very unappetizing results, it had already reviewed more than 400 studies about the irradiation process. But Jon tells us where that review process fell woefully short: “They accepted 226 studies for further review. They then narrowed their criteria and selected only 69 for in-depth review. Of these, the FDA itself reported that 32 of the 69 showed adverse effects, and 37 showed safety problems. Then without explanation, they eliminated all but 5 of the 69 (including every negative study) and said they would base their decision on those 5 alone.

“In the FDA’s final report approving food radiation, they wrote that when up to 35% of the lab-animal diet was radiated, feeding studies had to be terminated because of premature mortality or morbidity.” And in one test at the medical College of Virginia, rats fed irradiated beef “died of hemorrhagic syndrome in 34 days.”

Running from the radura

According to Jon, “Foods already approved for irradiation include: fruits, vegetables, wheat, flour, herbs, spices, nuts, seeds, peas, pork, and chicken.” And to that we can add ground beef – now in a supermarket in my neighborhood, and very likely in yours as well.

If you don’t like the idea of irradiated food (and at this point I can’t imagine how anyone possibly could), you can look for a symbol called the “radura” which is required on the packaging of irradiated foods. The radura is a green circle (broken into four segments at the top of the circle), enclosing a flower image represented by a large green dot with two petals below the dot.

But even if you avoid products marked with the radura, you’re still not in the clear. As Jon explains, “The FDA requires a label stating a food has been radiated if, and only if, it was radiated as a ‘whole food’ and then is sold unchanged. But, if you process it in any way, if you add any other ingredients to it, it no longer requires a label stating that it (or any of its ingredients) were irradiated. To put it simply, an irradiated orange would require a label; irradiated orange juice would not.”

An uncomfortable level of comfort

But even if people see the radura on a package of ground beef, a bag of Brazil nuts, or a sticker on an apple – do they know what its significance is? And worse, do they have any idea of the risks? By and large, my guess is “no.” In a report from Reuters last December, a survey conducted by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association found that almost half of Americans say they would feel comfortable purchasing irradiated meat. This response was 10 percent higher than it had been to the same question on a similar nationwide survey earlier in the year.

In other words, people are apparently becoming comfortable with the idea of irradiated food. And it seems they’ll have ample opportunity to buy it. SureBeam Corporation (the largest provider of irradiation technology in the U.S.) plans to process more than 300 million pounds of beef this year. Last year they processed only 15 million pounds.

Feel free to forward this e-Alert to friends and relatives. Help us spread the word that this idea, whose time has apparently come, is not a good idea, although it looks like it’s probably here to stay. So it may be the best that we can do to avoid irradiated foods by looking for the odd green flower.

My thanks to Jon Barron for his exhaustive profile of this subject. Jon has researched and written extensively about alternative medicine, nutrition, and herbal remedies for almost thirty years. For more information about Jon and his work, visit his web site at jonbarron.com.

To Your Good Health,

Jenny Thompson
Health Sciences Institute

Sources:
“U.S. Food Industry Begins to Embrace Irradiation” Jerry Bieszk, Reuters, 2/5/03
“Weis to Sell Irradiated Beef Through Pact With SureBeam” Dow Jones Business News, 1/29/03
“Parents Protest U.S. Schools Irradiated Meat Plan” Randy Fabi, Reuters, 12/13/02
“FDA Allowing Food Companies To Change Irradiation Label to ‘Cold Pasteurization'” Reuters, 10/9/02