Feed Lot vs. Grass Fed and e-coli. You decide.

Is there a cleaner meat?

You probably don’t want to think about it, but picture what cattle look like. Ok, now picture a hundred or so grain fed cattle on the size of a basketball field. They are standing outside in their feedlot. What do you see? I bet you are imagining right: the cattle are standing hoof-deep in manure and they are miserable.

It is pretty safe to say that cleaner meat is safer meat. So, now imagine pasture grazing cattle. What do you imagine now? They are walking around in grass, not cramped into a feed lot. You probably are imagining them being a lot cleaner than the grain fed cattle. You would be right!

The industrialized meat industry tries hard to provide clean and safe meat for customers, and they usually do an excellent job doing this. But accidents do happen, and the cleaner the cows go into the slaughterhouse, the safer their meat is going to be.

Meat Safety Tips:

You are still trying to convince yourself that your ordinary meat from any supermarket is safe for you and your family to eat, right? No one can really say for sure if the three pounds of roast beef you have sitting in the refrigerator are going to make you sick.

Regardless of whether you have natural and delicious grass fed beef or ordinary super market beef sausage to cook, remember these tips:

• Wash your hands with soap and water after handling raw or undercooked meat.
• Make sure to cook your meat long enough (steaks that are still bleeding put you at risk).
• Don’t forget to use a meat thermometer on your meats to ensure that they are cooked at a high enough temperature to kill bacteria.
• Don’t leave your meat out on the counter to defrost.
• Remember, if you aren’t going to use it within a day or two, freeze the uncooked meat now.
• Taste testing meat that was left out overnight (or longer for two hours) to see if it has gone bad yet is a bad idea. Don’t risk getting sick, just throw it out.
• Wash all knives and cutting boards with a bleach and water solution after cutting raw meat and before cutting anything else.

By following these tips, you can help reduce the amount of food borne illness from your meats, and hopefully keep your family safe.

Does My Meat Have E. Coli? Yes, it does.

This isn’t meant to scare you, but your meat from the supermarket has E. coli  (Escherichia coli). In fact, all meat does. There are thousands of E. coli bacteria in your intestines right now. Don’t worry, they usually aren’t harmful to you.

Let’s talk about the steps of E. coli contamination and find out how it can be bad for you.

1. Your body naturally has E. coli in it. It helps keep you alive, and you help keep it alive. Don’t worry about this type of E. coli, because it isn’t going to kill you.
2. Beef animals also have E. coli in their stomachs. It’s a different strain, and it isn’t safe for humans. When an animal is slaughtered, the E. coli in its stomach and intestines is often mixed in with the meat during the meat processing.
3. The meat goes to the supermarket, and you can’t see or smell the E. coli bacteria.
4. Here is where you have to be careful. If you don’t cook your meat to a high enough temperature for long enough, the E. coli bacteria won’t be killed off. You risk getting very sick (and if you are elderly, a small child or have a compromised immune system, you risk very serious illness and a chance of dying).
5. Your body usually can naturally fight off a few of the bad E. coli bacteria if they get into your system, and you won’t even notice they were there. If the meat contains many of the bad E. coli bacteria, you won’t be so lucky.

How do I know if I have E. coli?

E. coli is not a pretty illness to have. It is estimated that every year in the United States alone, 70,000 people become ill and 60 of those will die from dangerous strains of E. coli bacteria. If you get a nasty strain of the E. coli bacteria, you may confuse it with the flu or other illness. Here are some of the symptoms of E. coli. You may experience some or all of the following:

• Stomach cramps.
• Vomiting and nausea.
• Diarrhea.
• Fever..

These symptoms may last from 5 to 10 days. Sometimes however there are some serious complications that arise. Kidney failure and severe dehydration can result if you don’t take care of yourself and get medical attention.

How does Grass Fed Beef Reduce the Risk of E. coli?

Grass fed beef naturally contains less of the bad E. coli bacteria. Why? Because their diet is different from typical grain raised cattle. Grain raised cattle are raised on a pretty unnatural and unhealthy diet of grains, proteins and garbage. Their stomachs have to produce a lot more acids to break down these foods than cattle raised on grass or hay.

We already know that E. coli lives naturally in the stomach and intestines, so this shouldn’t be a problem, right? Well, it does become a problem when the extra stomach acids come along. The E. coli in cattle like to live in a neutral pH environment, so at first the acid kills the E. coli, but soon the bacteria gets smarter, and start to become resistant to the stomach acids. In other words, the surviving bacteria mutate and become acid loving. This will soon become the dangerous type of E. coli, because if we ingest this type of bacteria, it won’t be killed off by our stomach acids.

The healthy diet of natural American grass fed cattle ensures that nature stays in check, and that the E. coli bacteria don’t turn into a dangerous strain. There is always going to be bacteria in meat, because bacteria help to keep the animal healthy. The difference is do you want bacteria in your meat that is already resistant to a cattle’s stomach acids or do you want them to be natural and unchanged?

Why so much E. coli?

Why are there so much more E. coli bacteria in grain fed cattle? Because there are E. coli on the animal when they come into the slaughter house. Not only is it in their intestines, but it is also on the outside of their body. Grain fed animals stand in manure all day long in close quarters, and when the go to the slaughter house they are not as clean as grass fed or pasture raised beef animals. Grass fed beef cattle are very clean compared to grain fed animals, because they have more room to roam, and don’t have to stand in manure all day.

E. coli is not the only one… the Campylobacter bacteria

There are other dangers of eating grain fed beef. One of these dangers is a serious bacteria: campylobacter.

• 58% of cattle living on the feedlot carried campylobacter, while only 2% of pasture raised beef animals had it.
• Like E. coli, campylobacter is a food borne disease, and can be prevented by cooking the meat to a hot enough temperature.
• The symptoms begin two to ten days after eating the infected meat.
• Symptoms include nausea, abdominal pain, vomiting, fever, headache, and muscle pain.

The Hidden Cost

There is no question, that grass fed beef is a safer alternative. The choice is yours. It seems more expensive, but there are hidden costs associated with not eating pasture raised meats. These costs include poor health, environmental damage, higher cost of oil, corn and health care.

Original Post: http://www.organicgrassfedbeefinfo.com/safety-of-grass-fed-beef.html

USDA Lax on E. Coli Strain Linked to Beef Recall

(Aug. 30) — A strain of E. coli that the government doesn’t regulate has already sickened hamburger eaters in two states.

And federal food safety detectives say more cases may be identified as we approach the summer’s last big weekend for picnics and barbecues.

The supplier, Cargill Meat Solutions Corp. in Wyalusing, Pa., has recalled approximately 8,500 pounds of ground beef products. Cargill is the nation’s second-largest beef processor.

The meat was shipped to Connecticut and Maryland for distribution to other states.

Mike Martin, spokesman of Cargill Meat Solutions, said none of the three people who were reported sickened by the meat needed hospitalization. The meat was sent to BJ’s Wholesale Club stores in Maine, Maryland, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts, according to the USDA.

The Food Safety and Inspection Service received notice on Aug. 5 from state health and agriculture officials in Maine that they were tracking two patients with food poisoning identified as E. coli 026. Soon after, officials in New York state weighed in with a patient of their own. Other people in the Northeast with similar symptoms are being monitored by health officials.

E. coli 026 can cause bloody diarrhea, dehydration and, in severe cases, kidney failure. As with most other food pathogens, the very young, the aged and people with weak immune systems are the most susceptible to foodborne illness.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that PulseNet, its national network of public health and food regulatory agency laboratories, linked the illnesses.

As beef recalls go, so far this is small, but if more illnesses are identified and linked to the Cargill meat, it could grow.

Small or not, the Food Safety and Inspection Service had classified this a Class 1 recall, which the government says “is a health hazard situation where there is a reasonable probability that the use of the product will cause serious, adverse health consequences or death.”

There are scores of strains of E. coli in humans and animals. Most are harmless, a few even beneficial, but exposure to several strains can be deadly. The government zealously hunts for one strain in particular: E. coli 0157:H7. It can poison you and is the only one that USDA considers an adulterant, something that “contains any poisonous or deleterious substance which may render it injurious to health,” the feds say.

But the non-0157 strains — 026, 0103, 0111, 0121, 045 and 0145 — do a significant job sickening people. The CDC estimates that each year, at least 36,700 illnesses, 1,100 hospitalizations and 30 deaths are caused by these pathogens, which USDA refuses to regulate.

The actual number of illnesses may be considerably higher, Dr. Patricia Griffin, chief of CDC’s Enteric Diseases Epidemiology Branch, told AOL News last week.

The under-reporting may well be due to the lack of laboratories across the country that do pathogen studies that screen for the non-0157 strains, she said, and added that most physicians who send out stool samples from ill patients rarely ask for the test.

“Probably only 4 percent to 5 percent of the laboratories used by hospitals and health departments conduct the immunoassay test for the non-0157 strains, so we may be missing most of those outbreaks.” Griffin said.

For years, food safety advocates, members of Congress and public health specialists within the agency expressed concern over the USDA’s apparent indifference to protecting consumers from, at least, the six major non-0157 strains.

Seattle-based food safety lawyer Bill Marler led a costly personal crusade to draw attention to the need for USDA to consider the strains as adulterants in meat and demand that meat suppliers test for them.

Mansour Samadpour, president of IEH Laboratories, had his people in labs across the country collect samples of bulk ground beef from nearby groceries. They analyzed 5,000 samples for non-0157 E. coli and found 1 percent of the beef tainted. When you consider the billions of pounds of burger sold in this country, that’s a lot of disease-causing pathogens being served up.

Marler paid about $500,000 for the analysis and, earlier this year, Samadpour showed the results of his sampling and his testing method to a group of USDA scientists and regulators.

AOL News talked to two agency experts who attended the presentation. Both called Samadpour’s findings “frightening” and proof that the USDA has to do something. However, one of the pair, a longtime food safety expert, said the agency will do nothing until the bodies are stacking up.

The tens of thousands of illnesses that CDC tallied every year is a pretty tall stack, so why is USDA ignoring this?

“The meat industry is extremely powerful, particular the American Meat Institute,” Tony Corbo, a congressional food safety specialist with Food and Water Watch, told AOL News on Friday.

“Their lobbyists have been insistent that it is not a problem, and they have put a lot of pressure on USDA not to move forward with declaring these non-0157H7 strains as adulterants.”

On Aug. 18, the American Meat Institute wrote a seven-page letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack urging that the agency not pursue safety regulations and requirement for the non-0157 strains. Organization President Patrick Boyle wrote that it violates President Barack Obama’s food safety policies and “making a pathogen illegal through a policy change will not prevent this pathogen from occurring.”

There may be hope on the horizon. Corbo, Marler and others pushing for USDA to take actions against these E. coli strains cheered the swearing in last week of Dr. Elizabeth Hagen as undersecretary for food safety.

Previously, she was the chief medical officer at the Food Safety and Inspection Service, and people in the agency call her no-nonsense and someone who always puts safety first, especially when it comes to the nation’s food supply.

She may get the opportunity to work with a non-0157 outbreak sooner than she or anyone else thought.

Eating Organic: How Do People Afford it?

About El Dragón

Chief blogger at Fair Food fight. I have roughly 20 years experience with the natural foods industry, working as grocery stocker, produce buyer, marketer, and organic certification coordinator at various natural foods co-ops across the country. My two novels, THE PATRON SAINT OF PLAGUES and THE MAGICIAN AND THE FOOL (Bantam) are available through Amazon.com.

Nationwide meat recall announced

(CNN) — Zemco Industries in Buffalo, New York, has recalled approximately 380,000 pounds of deli meat that may be contaminated with bacteria that can cause a potentially fatal disease, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday.

The products were distributed to Wal-Marts nationwide, according to the USDA’s website.

The meats may be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes, which was discovered in a retail sample collected by inspectors in Georgia. The USDA has received no reports of illnesses associated with the meats.

Upon learning of the voluntary recall, Wal-Mart immediately told its stores to remove the meat from their shelves, the company said in a statement.

“Consumption of food contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes can cause listeriosis, an uncommon but potentially fatal disease,” according to the USDA. “Healthy people rarely contract listeriosis. However, listeriosis can cause high fever, severe headache, neck stiffness and nausea.

“Listeriosis can also cause miscarriages and stillbirths, as well as serious and sometimes fatal infections in those with weakened immune systems, such as infants, the elderly and persons with HIV infection or undergoing chemotherapy,” the USDA said.

The products subject to recall are:

– 25.5-pound cases of “Marketside Grab and Go Sandwiches BLACK FOREST HAM With Natural Juices Coated with Caramel Color” with the number 17800 1300.

– 28.49-pound cases of “Marketside Grab and Go Sandwiches HOT HAM, HARD SALAMI, PEPPERONI, SANDWICH PEPPERS” with the number 17803 1300.

– 32.67-pound cases of “Marketside Grab and Go Sandwiches VIRGINIA BRAND HAM With Natural Juices, MADE IN NEW YORK, FULLY COOKED BACON, SANDWICH PICKLES, SANDWICH PEPPERS” with the number 17804 1300.

– 25.5-pound cases of “Marketside Grab and Go Sandwiches ANGUS ROAST BEEF Coated with Caramel Color” with the number 17805 1300.

The meats were produced on dates ranging from June 18 to July 2, 2010. The “Use By” dates range from August 20 to September 10, 2010.

Wal-Mart noted the recall involves Marketside Grab and Go sandwiches, but not individual packages of deli meat. “We encourage customers who recently purchased this item to return it for a full refund,” the company statement said.

Cloned Meat May Already Have Invaded Our Food Supply, Posing Alarming Health Risks

It’s just a matter of time before we are eating clones, if we are not eating them now.

When Canadian agricultural leaders asked Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack last week after a scandal about unlabeled clone products in Europe if “cloned cows or their offspring have made it into the North American food supply,” he said, “I can’t say today that I can answer your question in an affirmative or negative way. I don’t know.”

And when AlterNet asked the USDA this week if cloned products are already in the food supply, a spokesman said the department was “not aware of an instance where product from an animal clone has entered the food supply” thanks to a “voluntary moratorium”– but that offspring of clones, at the heart of the Europe scandal,” are not clones and are therefore not included” in the voluntary moratorium.

Sounds like Europe is not the only place eating milk and meat from unlabeled clone offspring. In fact, the BBC, UK newspapers and even a US grocer all report that US consumers are digging into clone food, whether or not they know it.

Like bovine growth hormone and Roundup Ready crops, the government says clone products are so safe they don’t need to be labeled. But the 2008 FDA report (PDF), Animal Cloning: A Risk Assessment and a report from the European Food Safety Authority released at the same time, raise questions about the health of cloned animals, the safety of their milk and meat and even the soundness of the clone process itself.

To clone an animal, “scientists start with a piece of ear skin and mince it up in a lab. Then they induce the cells to divide in a culture dish until they forget they are skin cells and regain their ability to express all of their genes,” writes the Los Angeles Times’ Karen Kaplan. “Meanwhile, the nucleus is removed from a donor egg and placed next to a skin cell. Both are zapped with a tiny electric shock, and if all goes well the egg grows into a genetic copy of the original animal.”

So far so good except that it turns out many clones lack the ability to “reprogram the somatic nucleus of the donor to the state of a fertilized zygote,” says the FDA report and be the perfect replica a clone is supposed to be.

The reprogamming problem, called epigenetic dysregulation, means many clones — some say 90 percent — are born with deformities, enlarged umbilical cords, respiratory distress, heart and intestine problems and Large Offspring Syndrome, the latter often killing the clone and its “mother,” the surrogate dam. Clones that survive epigenetic dysregulation often require surgery, oxygen and transfusions at birth, eat insatiably but do not necessarily gain weight and fail to maintain normal temperatures, admits the report.

While denying that such dysregulation is endemic to cloning, the FDA report nonetheless reassures readers that “residual epigenetic reprogramming errors that could persist” in clones will “reset” over time. The errors will also “reset” in offspring who, though “the same as any other sexually-reproduced animals,” may nonetheless have them. Oops.

The FDA report, written in collaboration with Elizabethtown, PA-based Cyagra and Austin, TX-based ViaGen, another clone company, tries hard to talk around these and other clone problems. Too hard.

Although clones’ calcium, phosphorus, alkaline phosphatase and glucose levels exceed those seen in normal animals, “all of the elevations can be explained by the clones’ stage of life or stress level, and the increased levels observed do not represent a food consumption risk,” says the report.

The “slight mammary development” in a 4 1⁄2 month old Jersey calf? Such precociousness “sometimes occurs in conventional heifers if they are overfed.”

The rats fed cloned meat and milk who exhibited greater “frequency of vocalization,” a signal of emotional response? It was probably “incidental and unrelated to treatment,” says the report.

Cloned meat samples that show “altered” fatty acid composition and delta-9 desaturase? “No comparisons were made with historical reference values for either milk or meat,” says the report. Maybe it’s an overall trend in meat and milk…

Worse, the report relies on government regulation-as-usual to catch clone aberrations in the food supply. Nutrition Labeling Requirements will determine if clone milk is okay says the report since “determining whether animal clones are producing a hazardous substance in their milk although theoretically possible, is highly impractical.” (We can inject a nucleus into an egg but can’t analyze milk?)

And the hapless and sick throwaways that are cloning’s bycatch? Those animals won’t be a threat to the food supply says the FDA report, because they die at birth. And if they don’t die but remain sickly, they’ll be kept out the food supply by the same slaughterhouse inspectors who kept out mad cows, Hallmark school lunch cows and E. coli. Bon appetit.

“According to the three standards used to determine if cloned food is safe — nutrition, toxicology and chemical composition — eating cancerous tissue or pus would also be safe,” Dr. Shiv Chopra, a veterinarian, microbiologist and human rights activist told AlterNet when we asked about cloned food safety. It is like the wide-scale and unlabeled bovine growth hormone used to produce milk “in which a cow gene was inserted into E. coli,” says Dr. Chopra — a huge experiment conducted on the public.

Even meat and restaurant interests agree with Dr. Chopra in written comments about cloning on the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) web site.

Despite the science, there is an “important limitation” to cloning projections says Coldiretti, Italy’s largest farming interest group: “The impossibility to make prediction (sic) on a long term base. The ‘Inquiry into BSE’ [Mad Cow] shows how no scientists had been able to foresee the problems connected to the practice of recycling animal proteins in herbivores feeding. The BSE prion needed around 50 years to develop.”

CLITRAVI, the Brussels-based European Association for the Meat Processing Industry concurs. “In the light of EFSA’s own clearly expressed concerns regarding animal health and animal welfare, we take the view that further research is needed before offsprings of cloned animals are used for any purpose whatsoever, included medical,” it wrote.

The US-based Union of Concerned Scientists agrees that more research about cloning is necessary — not to mention labeling. “The choice of whether to purchase such foods should be in the hands of individual consumers, not the government or the industry. Consumers will have such a choice only if the foods are labeled,” says the 250,000-member nonprofit science group.

In defending cloning, the FDA, Big Meat and Biotech claim its negatives are no worse than in vitro fertilization and other Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) techniques already entrenched in factory farms, and that it will aid “world hunger.” Animal suffering is downplayed by simply not counting the animals who don’t make it in final figures leading the World Society for the Protection of Animals to observe that welfare and mortality are not just risks for surviving clones but effects that “occur in a large proportion of surrogate dams and clones.”

While the FDA admits that clone calves that “die or are euthanized due to poor health” are rendered into animal feed byproducts that present “possible risks” to food animals and the people who eat them, it is less worried about healthy clones. Healthies are “unlikely” to be used for human food “given their potential value as breeding stock” or even used as animal food, “except through rendering of dead clones that occurred at parturition or by accident.”

Since the first cloned mammal, Dolly the sheep, was created in 1996, cloning has become more common and causes less outrage than new Frankenfoods like the Enviropig with its roundworm gene and AquAdvantage salmon with its Chinook salmon gene (both moving toward FDA approval.) But whether it’s become common in our food no one can know — because it’s unlabeled. And could be anywhere.

Senate and House disagree whether WIC should include more organic

If the House of Representatives gets its way, low-income mothers and their children will not have access to a wide range of certified organic foods. The Child Nutrition Reauthorization Act is up for renewal on Sept. 30, 2010 and mandates specific foods that must be included as part of the Women, Infants, Children Program. To date, the Senate version of the Act insists on the inclusion of a variety of organic foods for WIC recipients, while the House version includes only organic produce.

WIC is a federally funded, state-controlled initiative that provides nutritional assistance to low income pregnant and post-partum women and children up to age five who are nutritionally at risk. Each state decides which foods it will include on the list, though the federal government can mandate that certain food categories be on the list.

If the Senate version passes, low-income consumers would have access to foods that could ultimately provide lifelong benefits. “Final passage of the Child Nutrition Reauthorization Act provides Congress a chance to address both unfinished business and new opportunities to promote healthy development,” said Charles Benbrook, PhD, chief scientist at the Organic Center, based in Boulder, Colo. “Providing easier access for moms, families and children to fresh, nutrient dense organic and locally grown fruits and vegetables is a key piece of unfinished business. Expanding access to organic dairy products will promote healthy brain and nervous system development because of the far healthier balance in omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids in organic dairy products,” he said.

One of the perceived barriers to placing more organic foods on the WIC list is cost, even though retailers say they are willing to work within the cost constraints. “Many co-ops and natural food stores across the country want to meet the needs of their communities, including families that rely on WIC,” said Robynn Shrader, chief executive officer for the National Cooperative Grocers Association, which represents 114 natural food co-ops nationwide. “By allowing states to prohibit nutritious and organic purchases, WIC limits the benefit it can provide people who need WIC’s assistance most.”

The Organic Trade Association is asking you to call your member of Congress (not Senate) to include organic foods in the WIC program.

Calif. company recalls 1M pounds of ground beef

MODESTO, Calif. – A meat processor recalled about 1 million pounds of ground beef products Friday after seven people were sickened by E. coli contamination.

Valley Meat Co., of Modesto, sold the potentially contaminated beef patties and ground beef in California, Texas, Oregon, Arizona and internationally, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said.

The beef was processed from Oct. 2, 2009, to Jan. 12, 2010. Most of the products were sold frozen and the company was working to remove them from grocery store shelves.

“This is the first recall in our history and we will investigate the matter thoroughly and take any measures deemed necessary to further elevate our safety standards, protect consumers, and ensure confidence in our products,” Valley Meat said in a statement.

All of the recalled products have the establishment number “EST. 8268″ inside the label’s USDA mark of inspection. Valley Meat said consumers should discard possibly affected meat or return it to stores for a refund.

The California Department of Health notified the USDA in mid-July of a cluster of E. coli-related illnesses, leading to the recall. A department spokesman said officials would issue a statement later Friday.

Tests identified the bacteria as E. coli O157:H7, the strain most commonly responsible for food poisoning. Symptoms of infection often include severe stomach cramps, diarrhea, vomiting and a low fever. More serious infections can lead to kidney failure, brain damage and sometimes death.

___

Online:

Full list of affected products: http://www.valleymeat.com/our-team/recall-information/

Hold the Mayo, Extra Pesticides: Americans are sold on organics.

Over the past decade, organic produce sales have soared from 3 percent of the retail produce market in the U.S. in 2000 to nearly 11 percent last year, to $9.5 billion. According to surveys by the Organic Trade Association, organic produce’s precipitous trajectory barely slowed when the global financial crisis took hold in late 2008.

Organic salad greens have fared even more impressively. According to Nielsen surveys, fresh cut salad greens increased their market share from 8.3 percent in 2006 to 15 percent so far this year. Pre-packaged specialty salads have grabbed a whopping 46 percent of that market sector, compared to 29 percent.

The stunning gains make a sharp contrast to the otherwise lackluster market for fruits and vegetables in recent years.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service (ERS) reports that Americans’ per capita annual consumption of fresh fruit and vegetables has been roughly flat for the past two decades. In fact, according to the ERS, U.S. vegetable consumption has slumped slightly, to 92.2 pounds per person per year in 2008, from an all-time peak of 101 pounds in 1999.

These troubling eating habits have persisted despite warnings from a succession of U.S. Surgeons General that the national obesity epidemic is rivaled only by tobacco as a danger to public health.

There are many reasons Americans aren’t eating healthier. Surveys of consumer expenditures conducted by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics show that in 2008, Americans spent 58 percent of their food dollars on food eaten in the home and 42 percent for food eaten out. According to the ERS, Americans spent only 26 percent of their food dollars eating in 1970. The calorie count of those meals climbed accordingly, ERS says, and nutritional value declined. ERS statisticians have cited a number of factors behind the demise of home cooking, including the rising number of two-earner families, cheaper, prevalent fast-food outlets, relentless promotion by restaurant and fast-food chains and generational preferences.

What no thinking person will believe is the latest claim from industrial agribusiness – that Americans aren’t consuming more fruits and vegetables because Environmental Working Group publishes its Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides™ on produce.

This bizarre charge comes from the Alliance for Food and Farming, a Watsonville, California-based association of large produce growers and marketers and pesticide sellers.

“Small wonder Americans don’t eat enough fruit and vegetables,” says Ken Cook, EWG president and co-founder. “These guys couldn’t market their way out of a disposable plastic produce bag.”

By every objective measure, an increasing number of Americans are voting with their pocketbooks for produce free of pesticides.

“It’s hard to avoid the conclusion,” says Cook, “that the chemical farming coalition members are less concerned about EWG’s “dirty dozen” list, or the health and girth of the American people, than they are about losing so much market share in recent years to organic fruits and vegetables.”

The expansion of the organic food sector is not news to EWG. Nearly 100,000 readers have downloaded our Shopper’s Guide in the last two months. These are people who are actively seeking objective facts about pesticide residues on various conventionally-raised produce items. EWG recommends that people eat more fruits and vegetables because the health benefits of these foods outweigh the risks of pesticide exposure.

The Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides™ has been praised as a key resource for consumers aiming for healthier diets. Since many shoppers can’t find or afford organic produce, they can use the Shopper’s Guide to avoid those conventional fruits and vegetables found to be highest in pesticides – the Dirty Dozen™ – and, instead, choose items from the Clean Fifteen™ list.

But, we are sorry to say, EWG and the many other groups that advocate pesticide-free food cannot yet claim credit for transforming mass buying habits. Since we began publishing the Shopper’s Guide in 1995, consumption of many items on the Dirty Dozen™ list has actually increased. Take spinach, a charter member of the Dirty Dozen™: the ERS estimates that Americans ate two-thirds of a pound in 2008, a 142 percent increase over 1995. Per-capita leaf lettuce consumption nearly doubled in that period. The same trend held true for other Dirty Dozen™ perennials, like bell peppers (up 40 percent), cherries (up 250 percent), strawberries (up 57 percent) and grapes (up 14 percent).

If Big Agriculture wants to promote healthier diets, it should stop attacking critics and focus on growing vegetables and fruits that are chemical-free – and also tasty.

“These are the same geniuses who for decades have brought us tomatoes as hard as baseballs, apples that mush in your mouth, and lettuce fit for shredding at fast food joints,” says Cook. “Their motto ought to be: ‘Less flavor! Tastes grate!’ And they wonder why the American public hasn’t responded to their sermonizing to eat more fruit and vegetables.”

“Americans can’t seem to get enough of the organic industry’s delicious, healthy food,” says Cook. “It has emerged as one of the most dynamic sectors in the American food industry. One of the main reasons? Believe it or not, people don’t want to eat pesticides with their produce if they don’t have to. And with EWG’s guide, they don’t.”

That is why EWG’s Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides™ has become so popular among consumers and why the agribusiness industry is objecting to it. At EWG, we remember what Big Ag has long since forgotten or forsaken – the foundation stone of American commerce, that the customer is always right.

When customers say they want fresh, appetizing and diverse offering of fruits and vegetables without a load of pesticides, we say, give it to them.

What Big Agriculture seems to be saying is, “Shut up and eat your pesticides.”

1 in 4 Minnesotans obese, but but not as fat as other Americans

Chemicals in meat may be linked to bladder cancer

No significant effects were found for total red, white or processed meat consumption. Similarly, no link was made between bladder cancer and the consumption of heterocyclic amines, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or total nitrites or nitrates from processed meat.

During the cooking process, nitrites and nitrates combine with other chemicals that are naturally present in meat to form potentially cancer-causing N-nitroso compounds, which may then be excreted through the urinary tract where they can contact the lining of the bladder.

Animal studies have suggested that N-nitroso compounds are associated with bladder cancer, but there has been limited evidence of their effects on humans. In general, studies linking meat and bladder cancer have been inconsistent.

While these findings are not conclusive and can’t lead to any direct health advice, noted Cross, meat intake is thought to be a risk factor for other cancers. She points to a 2007 World Cancer Research Fund and American Institute for Cancer Research report, which concluded that individuals should “limit consumption of red meats (such as beef, pork and lamb) and avoid processed meat (ham, bacon, salami).”

SOURCE: http://link.reuters.com/kem82n Cancer, online August 2, 201

There is More of a Demand For Organic Foods Than You Might Think

The idea of eating healthier is one that many people really do like. After exploring the value of organic foods and the fact they can stay away from harmful toxins they are all for it. The fact that organic foods are dropping in price means that more people can afford to buy them. This isn’t just a passing trend though that people are taking an interest in. It is their way of eating better and taking a stand against the toxins in foods and their problems for the environment.

There is more of a demand for organic foods than you might think. It continues to spread all over the world. In fact, the United States is one of the areas with a great growth but it is nothing compared to that of Canada and Australia. In a recent survey though 70% of Americans said they occasionally buy organic foods.

More than $25 billion was made by the sell of organic foods in 2005 so you can image what that number is up to today. One of the reasons that many entities want to get involved is that amount of money. Many are also scared that their high sales through traditional growth methods is about to come to a halt. Consumers are showing they want more organic food products. Therefore they want to be able to offer them so they don’t lose the loyal customers they have come to rely upon.

With the increased demand for organic foods more farmers are trying to get their land ready for the growing of such products. However, it is a process that takes time to complete. You may not realize it but before the FDA will even do an inspection the land has to be free from the use of any chemicals for a period of at least five years.

For those farmers just now getting involved with this, they have that waiting period to go through. Then they have to get the certification from the FDA, plant their crops, and then have their first harvest. So this isn’t a process that you can rush by any means. The good news is that there are quite a few farms in the various stages of that five year term right now. That means each year more and more of them will qualify and earn their certification.

Due to the overwhelming demand for organic foods there has been some talk in congress about changing the requirements. They would be less than they are right now for farmers to become certified to create organic foods. Yet this is something that many are fighting against. They want these tough standards to be in place so that the division between organic foods and those traditionally grown can be clearly defined and not negotiated.

Consumers will find that the cost of organic foods continues to drop though as more farmers get involved. That type of competition to meet the demand means that buyers can find a variety of prices offered. With lower prices the cycle will continue because there are plenty of consumers interested in organic foods, they just can’t justify the cost right now.

It is going to be very exciting to see what the future holds in the way of organic foods for the world. This is definitely an idea that is here to stay and that continues to increase. You can be sure we will come up with faster methods to get the planting and harvesting done too. The benefits for our health as well as for our environment through organic farming is something we should all be eager to see move forward.

Organic food not only mean health life but also mean care about the environment.

Meat with antibiotics off the menu at some hospitals

Concerned about drug-resistant pathogens, medical professionals push to limit antibiotic use in animal farming.

By Monica Eng, Tribune reporter

The evening’s menu featured grass-fed, antibiotic-free beef over pasta, fresh seasonal vegetables and fresh organic peaches — items right at home in the city’s finest restaurants.

Instead, the dishes were prepared for visitors, staff and bed-bound patients at Swedish Covenant Hospital.

The Northwest Side hospital is one of 300 across the nation that have pledged to improve the quality and sustainability of the food they serve, not just for the health of their patients but, they say, the health of the environment and the U.S. population.

For many of these institutions, the initiative includes buying antibiotic-free meats. Administrators say they hope increased demand for those products will reduce the use of antibiotics to treat cattle and other animals, which scientists believe helps pathogens become more resistant to drugs. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that antibiotic-resistant infections kill 60,000 Americans a year.

Although the U.S. doesn’t keep national records on antibiotic use in animals, the Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that up to 70 percent of all antibiotics used in the U.S. are administered to healthy animals to speed growth and compensate for crowded living conditions. Some of these drugs, such as penicillin and tetracycline, are also used to treat sick people.

Last week, as a congressional panel debated the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in agriculture, Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., presented a petition organized by the nonprofit coalition Health Care Without Harm and signed by more than 1,000 health care professionals supporting the Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act. Introduced by Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., it would phase out the nontherapeutic use in animals of seven types of medically important antibiotics.

Last month the Food and Drug Administration also released draft guidelines for the “judicious use” of antibiotics for growth promotion in animals. The CDC and the U.S. Department of Agriculture support the FDA’s guidance, which states that “using medically important antimicrobial drugs for production or growth enhancing purposes … in food-producing animals is not in the interest of protecting and promoting the public health.”

Meat producers respond that there is not enough evidence to definitively link human antibacterial-resistant infection to animal use.

“The CDC, FDA and USDA all say that they believe there is a link, but we don’t know,” said Dave Warner, spokesman for the National Pork Producers Council. “They believe it, so they are going to ban these products because of a belief and not a scientific fact?”

Hospital administrators who have signed on to buy antibiotic-free meat say they hope to use their purchasing power to discourage the use of antibiotics in agriculture. According to the Association for Healthcare Foodservice, the institutions spend about $9.6 billion on food and drink a year.

An early adopter of healthier hospital menus, Swedish Covenant’s director of nutrition, Maria Simmons, started serving grass-fed antibiotic- and hormone-free Tallgrass beef nearly five years ago. While the hospital’s purchases of other sustainable foods have fluctuated with budgets and availability, this item has been a constant.

Simmons said the hospital uses the beef in one menu item a day served to patients and in the cafeteria, including “meat sauces, Salisbury steaks, meatloaf, beef stew and in our Korean seaweed soup.”

Diane Imrie, director of nutrition services at Fletcher Allen Health Care in Vermont, also started serving antibiotic-free beef at the hospital in recent years as part of her plan to switch to local, seasonal, sustainable food.

“When we started a sustainability council at the hospital a few years ago, antibiotic reduction was one of the first things on my list,” she said. “I think it has the most impact on farming, the environment and public health.”

Imrie estimated that her food costs rose about $67,000 last year when she switched to antibiotic-free chicken from conventional. “But that’s also about the same cost as treating a single MRSA infection,” she said, referring to drug-resistant staphylococcus bacteria.

Like Simmons, Imrie said she has found inventive ways to offset the cost of the antibiotic-free meats, such as choosing ground beef and stewing cuts instead of more expensive options. Simmons said the beef she buys ranges from 50 cents to $1 more a pound.

Simmons also said she is able to negotiate with vendors because the hospital buys food in large amounts. “Once they realize the volume and the fact that you will keep buying this, they work with you,” she said.

Carolyn Lammersfeld, national director of nutrition at Cancer Treatment Centers of America, oversees a menu full of organic, antibiotic-free chicken, beef and dairy at the organization’s facilities across the country.

Using the ingredients is primarily a response to patient demand, Lammersfeld said, but the centers are also “watching the controversy over the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics and their potential to cause resistant strains of bacteria.”

The issue is of particular concern for cancer patients, who have compromised immune systems, she noted. “Many also might already being taking antibiotics, so they don’t want additional ones in food if they can avoid it,” Lammersfeld said.

Simmons said she buys the Tallgrass beef “not only because is it antibiotic- and hormone-free but it’s higher in omega-3 fatty acids, conjugated linoleic acids and lower in saturated fats.”

But she is also aware of the effects that creating a demand for the meat may have on animal raising practices.

The push was for healthier food all around and the fact that it was antibiotic- and hormone-free and could support the new legislation on antibiotic resistance just worked well together,” Simmons said. “It’s a natural progression.”

Original Post: http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/ct-met-hospital-meat-20100718,0,5448653.story?page=1

What IS sewer sludge? You’ll see why USDA Certified Organic foods don’t contain it.

In the mid-1980s, a citizens’ organization in New Jersey–Clean
Ocean Action, led by Cindy Zipf–launched an aggressive campaign
to protect the oceans from the dumping of toxic sewage sludge.
They were up against extraordinary power: U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) opposed them; New York and New Jersey
environmental officials opposed them; nearly every municipal
government opposed them. But they persevered and won.

Thus in the early 1990s, municipalities had to find other places
to dump their sewage sludge.

As we saw last week, sewage sludge is the mud-like material that
remains after bacteria have digested the human wastes that flow
from your toilet into your local sewage treatment plant. If
human wastes were the only substances entering the sewage
treatment plant, then sewage sludge would contain only nutrients
and should be returned to the land.

Unfortunately, most sewage treatment plants receive industrial
toxic wastes, which are then mixed with the human wastes,
creating a poorly-understood mixture of nutrients and industrial
poisons. Furthermore, many American cities have built sewage
systems that mix storm water runoff with the regular sewage;
every time a rain storm scours these cities’ streets, additional
toxins are added to the sewage sludge.

As a result, sewage sludge contains a strange brew of nutrients
laced with low levels of PCBs [polychlorinated biphenyls];
dioxins and furans; chlorinated pesticides [such as DDT, DDD,
DDE, dieldrin, aldrin, endrin, chlordane, heptachlor, lindane,
mirex, kepone, 2,4,5-T, and 2,4-D]; carcinogenic polynuclear
aromatic hydrocarbons [PAHs]; heavy metals [arsenic, mercury,
lead, selenium, cadmium, etc.]; bacteria, viruses, parasitic
worms, and fungi;[1] industrial solvents; asbestos; petroleum
products, and on and on. American industry uses roughly 70,000
different chemicals and any of these can be found in sewage
sludge –depending on who’s pouring what down the drain at any
given time and place. In addition to the original chemicals,
unique metabolites and degradation products develop anew in
sludge. To give but one example: trimethylamine can be converted
to the powerful carcinogen, dimethylnitrosamine.[2]

The U.S. produces 5.3 million metric tonnes (11.6 billion pounds)
of sewage sludge each year (that’s dry weight, not including the
weight of the water that carries it). Today about 16% of U.S.
sewage sludge is incinerated and the ashes are buried in
landfills; 38% of sludge is landfilled directly; 36% is spread
onto farmland or forest land or otherwise mixed into soils; and
10% is handled in other ways (piled on the land and abandoned,
for example).[3]

The sewage treatment industry –and the municipal governments
that employ them –represent a powerful political force in the
U.S. Together in the late 1980s they figured out that the
cheapest thing to do with sewage sludge is to spread it onto or
into the land, preferably as close to its point of origin as
possible, to minimize transport costs.

However, there were obstacles to overcome. The public thinks of
sewage sludge as dirty, smelly and dangerous. Few people thought
sewage sludge sounded good as fertilizer for food. So the
industry hired a public relations firm, Powell Tate, and renamed
sewage sludge “biosolids.” They convinced U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) to go along with this verbal
detoxification. The Federation of Sewage Works Associations also
renamed itself –they are now the Water Environment Federation
(WEF).[4]

The scientific literature on sewage sludge is large, but much of
it consists of articles intended to break down public resistance
to the use of sewage sludge on farm land. It is “happy
literature,” not necessarily honest literature. Nevertheless,
there is a core of serious research that has tried to discover
what the consequences might be if farmers adopted sewage sludge
as fertilizer. In recent months, we have examined this
literature, and here is what we found:

** Sewage sludge is mutagenic (it causes inheritable genetic
changes in organisms),[5,6] but no one seems sure what this means
for human or animal health. In its regulations for sewage
sludge, EPA has simply ignored this information.[7,8]

** Two-thirds of sewage sludge contains asbestos. Because sludge
is often applied to the land dry, asbestos may be a real health
danger to farmers, neighbors and their children.[9,10,11] In its
sludge regulations, EPA does not mention asbestos.[7,8]

** EPA issued numeric standards for 10 metals (arsenic, cadmium,
chromium, copper, lead, mercury, molybdenum, nickel, selenium,
and zinc).[8] However, the movement of metals from soils into
groundwater, surface water, plants, and wildlife –and of the
hundreds of other toxins in sludge, which EPA chose not to
regulate –are poorly understood.[12] Their movement depends
upon at least the following factors: plant species, soil type,
soil moisture, soil acidity or alkalinity, sludge application
rate, slope, drainage, and the specific chemistry of the toxins
and of the sludge itself.[13,14]

** Soil acidity seems to be the key factor in promoting or
retarding the movement of toxic metals into groundwater,
wildlife, and crops.[15,16] In creating its regulations, EPA
assumed that sludge-treated land would be under the perpetual
care of a farmer who would lime the soil to keep it alkaline and
prevent the metals from moving dangerously. For this reason, a
buildup of toxic heavy metals in soils is often dismissed as
irrelevant. But in the real world, farmers go out of business
while acid precipitation keeps soaking soils with dilute acid
year after year. A buildup of toxic heavy metals in soil
today[17] seems to be a prescription for trouble 30 to 50 years
down the road.[18]

The National Research Council (NRC) of the National Academy of
Sciences gives sewage sludge treatment of soils a clean bill of
health in the short term, “as long as… acidic soils are
agronomically managed.” However the NRC acknowledges that toxic
heavy metals and persistent organic pollutants can build up in
treated soils: “Potentially harmful trace elements and certain
persistent organic chemicals in raw municipal wastewater become
concentrated in the sludge during the treatment process, and,
with repeated applications of sludge to the land, these chemicals
may accumulate in the soil,” says the NRC.[3] If such a buildup
occurs and the soils are no longer “agronomically managed” but
are left alone to be washed by acid rain in perpetuity, what will
happen then?

** Research clearly shows that, under some conditions (which are
not fully understood), toxic metals and organic industrial
poisons can be transferred from sludge-treated soils into
crops.[19] Lettuce, spinach, cabbage, Swiss chard, and carrots
have all been shown to accumulate toxic metals and/or toxic
chlorinated hydrocarbons when grown on soils treated with sewage
sludge.[20,21,22,23,24]

** In some instances, toxic organics contaminate the leafy parts
of plants by simply volatilizing out of the sludge.[2]

** There is good reason to believe that livestock grazing on
plants treated with sewage sludge will ingest the pollutants
–either through the grazed plants, or by eating sewage sludge
along with the plants. Sheep eating cabbage grown on sludge
developed lesions of the liver and thyroid gland. Pigs grown on
corn treated with sludge had elevated levels of cadmium in their
tissues.[25] Cows, goats, and sheep are also likely to eat
sludge directly. In grazing, these animals may pull up plants by
the roots and thus ingest substantial quantities of soil. A cow
may ingest as much as 500 kg (1100 pounds) of soil each year.[26]

** Small mammals have been shown to accumulate heavy metals after
sewage sludge was applied to forest lands. Shrews, shrew-moles,
and deer mice absorbed metals from sludge.[27] Insects in the
soil absorb toxins, which then accumulate in birds.[28]

** It has been shown that sewage sludge applied to soils can
increase the dioxin intake of humans eating beef (or cow’s milk)
produced from those soils.[29,30] Humans in the industrial world
already carry unsafe burdens of dioxin in their bodies, according
to EPA. (See REHW #390, #391, and #414.) From a public health
perspective, any unnecessary addition of dioxin to human food
chains is unthinkable and unacceptable.

** Sewage sludge is produced in the huge quantities day after
day, year after year. Sludge never takes a holiday.
Municipalities find themselves under relentless pressure to get
rid of the stuff, day after day after day. It is exceedingly
expensive to treat it to clean it up. Towns and cities have every
inducement to cut corners, skimp on tests, fudge the numbers,
claim that their sludge is cleaner than it really is. Farmers
have no capacity to analyze sludge independently; they must rely
on the word of the sludge supplier. Only an aggressive,
independent oversight agency can protect public health. Where
can such an agency be found? Who has confidence that their state
government, or U.S. EPA, will play that role?

EPA has acknowledged that it hasn’t adequate funding to oversee
the nation’s sewage sludge management program.[31,32] “At
headquarters, staff has been cut dramatically over the last year,
and we can only do so much,” one EPA official told BIOCYCLE
magazine.[31] And a Washington state official said, “…with EPA
cutting back from financing the sludge program, the problem will
be whether state or local officials have the resources to
adequately oversee every [sludge] application site.”[3]

Who, then, will protect public health from the purveyors of toxic
sludge? Who will protect the nation’s agricultural soils from
contamination, providing food security for future generations?

And, finally, who will lead the transition to a truly sustainable
way of managing human waste?[33]
–Peter Montague
(National Writers Union, UAW Local 1981/AFL-CIO)

===============
[1] Herbert R. Pahren and others, “Health risks associated with
land application of municipal sludge,” JOURNAL OF THE WATER
POLLUTION CONTROL FEDERATION Vol. 51, No. 11 (November 1979),
pgs. 2588-2601.

[2] J.G. Babish, D.J. Lisk and others, ORGANIC TOXICANTS AND
PATHOGENS IN SEWAGE SLUDGE AND THEIR ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS
[Special Report No. 42] (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University,
December, 1981).

[3] Gary D. Krauss and Albert L. Page, “Wastewater, Sludge and
Food Crops,” BIOCYCLE (February 1997), pgs. 74-82. Krauss was
staff director for the National Research Council study, USE OF
RECLAIMED WATER AND SLUDGE IN FOOD CROP PRODUCTION (Washington,
D.C.: National Academy Press, 1996).

[4] John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, TOXIC SLUDGE IS GOOD FOR
YOU (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 1995), pgs. 100-101.

[5] K.C. Donnelly and others, “Mutagenic Potential of Municipal
Sewage Sludge Amended soils,” WATER, AIR AND SOIL POLLUTION Vol.
48 (1989), pgs. 435-449.

[6] Philip K. Hopke and others, “Comparison of the Mutagenicity
of Sewage Sludges,” ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY Vol. 18
(1984), pgs. 909-916.

[7] Environmental Protection Agency, “40 CFR Part 503; National
Sewage Sludge Survey; Availability of Information and Data, and
Anticipated Impacts on Proposed Regulations; Proposed Rule,”
FEDERAL REGISTER November 9, 1990, pgs. 47210-47283.

[8] The “Part 503″ sewage sludge regulations are available on
diskette from the National Technical Information Service [NTIS];
telephone 1-800-553-6847; purchase item No. PB93-500478INC;
price: $60.00.

[9] Charles G. Manos and others, “Prevalence of Asbestos in
Sewage Sludges From 51 Large and Small Cities in the United
States,” CHEMOSPHERE Vol. 22, Nos. 9-10 (1991), pgs. 963-967.

[10] Charles G. Manos and others, “Prevalence of Asbestos in
Composted Waste from 26 Communities in the United States,”
ARCHIVES OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION AND TOXICOLOGY Vol. 23,
No. 2 (August, 1992), pgs. 266-269.

[11] Ed Haag, “Sludge under suspicion,” FARM JOURNAL (March
1992), pgs. 16-19.

[12] J.E. Welch and L.J. Lund, “Zinc Movement in
Sewage-Sludge-Treated Soils as Influenced by Soil Properties,
Irrigation Water Quality, and Soil Moisture Level,” SOIL SCIENCE
Vol. 147, No. 3 (March 1989), pgs. 208-214.

[13] J.P. Schmidt, “Understanding Phytotoxicity Thresholds for
Trace Elements in Land-applied Sewage Sludge,” JOURNAL OF
ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY Vol. 26 (January -February 1997), pgs. 4-10.

[14] Ed Haag, “Just Say No,” DAIRY TODAY (March 1992), pgs. 82-83.

[15] S.R. Smith, “Effect of Soil pH on Availability to Crops of
Metals in Sewage Sludge-Treated Soils. II. Cadmium Uptake by
Crops and Implications for Human Dietary Intake,” ENVIRONMENTAL
POLLUTION Vol. 86 (1994), pgs. 5-13.

[16] Sara Brallier and others, “Liming Effects on Availability of
Cd, Cu, Ni, and Zn in a Soil Amended with Sewage Sludge 16 Years
Previously,” WATER, AIR AND SOIL POLLUTION Vol. 86 (1996), pgs.
195-206.

[17] K.P. Raven and R.H. Loeppert, “Heavy Metals in the
Environment,” JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY Vol. 26
(March-April 1997), pgs. 551-557.

[18] Brian J. Alloway and Andrew P. Jackson, “The Behaviour of
Heavy Metals in Sewage Sludge-Amended Soils,” THE SCIENCE OF THE
TOTAL ENVIRONMENT Vol. 100 (1991), pgs. 151-176.

[19] Donald J. Lisk and others, “Survey of Toxicants and
Nutrients in Composted Waste Materials,” ARCHIVES OF
ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION AND TOXICOLOGY Vol. 22 (1992), pgs.
190-194.

[20] Min-Jian Wang and Kevin C. Jones, “Uptake of Chlorobenzenes
by Carrots from Spiked and Sewage Sludge-Amended Soil,”
ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Vol. 28, No. 7 (1994), pgs.
1260-1267.

[21] Min-Jian Wang and Kevin C. Jones, “Behaviour and Fate of
Chlorobenzenes (CBs) Introduced into Soil-Plant Systems by Sewage
Sludge Application: A Review,” CHEMOSPHERE Vol. 28, No. 7 (1994),
pgs. 1325-1360.

[22] Rufus L. Chaney, “Public Health and Sludge Utilization,”
BIOCYCLE (October 1990), pgs. 68-73.

[23] A.C. Chang and others, “Cadmium Uptake for Swiss Chard Grown
on Composted Sewage Sludge Treated Field Plots: Plateau or Time
Bomb?,” JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY Vol. 26 (January
-February 1997), pgs. 11-19.

[24] Yutaka Iwata and others, “Uptake of a PCB (Aroclor 1254)
from Soil by Carrots under Field Conditions,” BULLETIN OF
ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION & TOXICOLOGY Vol. 11, No. 6 (1974),
pgs. 523-528.

[25] See D.J. Lisk and others, “Toxicologic Studies with Swine
Fed Corn Grown on Municipal Sewage Sludge-Amended Soil,” JOURNAL
OF ANIMAL SCIENCE Vol. 55, No. 3 (1982), pgs. 613-619.

[26] M.M. Varma and W. Wade Talbot, “Organic Pollutants in
Municipal Sludge -Health Risks,” JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL SYSTEMS
Vol. 16, No. 4 (1986-87), pgs. 295-308.

[27] Linda J. Hegstrom and Stephen D. West, “Heavy Metal
Accumulation in Small Mammals following Sewage Sludge Application
to Forests,” JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY Vol. 18 (July
-September 1989), pgs. 345-349.

[28] Thomas S. Davis and others, “Uptake of Polychlorobiphenyls
Present in Trace Amounts from Dried Municipal Sewage Sludge
Through an Old Field Ecosystem,” BULLETIN OF ENVIRONMENTAL
CONTAMINATION AND TOXICOLOGY Vol. 27 (1981), pgs. 689-694.

[29] Simon R. Wild and others, “The Influence of Sewage Sludge
Applications to Agricultural Land on Human Exposure to
Polychlorinated Dibenzo-P-dioxins (PCDDs) and -Furans (PCDFs),”
ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION Vol. 83 (1994), pgs. 357-369.

[30] Michael S. McLachlan and others, “A Study of the Influence
of Sewage Sludge Fertilization on the Concentrations of PCDD/F
and PCB in Soil and Milk,” ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION Vol. 85
(1994), pgs. 337-343.

[31] Nora Goldstein, “EPA Streamlines Biosolids Management
Programs,” BIOCYCLE (July 1995), pgs. 58-60.

[32] “EPA and Stakeholders Outline New Biosolids Management
Approaches,” BIOCYCLE (August 1995), pg. 6.

[33] Robert Goodland and Abby Rockefeller, “What is Environmental
Sustainability in Sanitation?” IETC’S INSIGHT [newsletter of the
United Nations Environment Programme, International Environmental
Technology Centre] Summer, 1996), pgs. 5-8. The International
Environmental Technology Centre can be reached at: UNEP-IETC,
2-1110 Ryokuchikoen, Tsurumi-ku, Osaka 538, Japan. Telephone:
(81-6) 915-4580; fax: (81-6) 915-0304; E-mail:
cstrohma@unep.or.jp; URL: http://www.unep.or.jp/.

Descriptor terms: sewage sludge; clean ocean action; cindy zipf;
epa; pcbs; dioxin; asbestos; bioaccumulation; wildlife; forests;
birds; mammals; agriculture; farming; farm land; soil;
dimethylnitrosamine; dioxin; pesticides; nutrients; mutagens;
carcinogens; arsenic; cadmium; chromium; copper; lead; mercury;
molybdenum; nickel; selenium; zinc; acid rain; acid
precipitation; livestock; regulation; regulations; beef; cow’s
milk;

Report: BPA makes canned food risky for pregnant women

The chemical is used in countless products, from plastic bottles and paper receipts to the linings of metal cans. The National Toxicology Program has said it has “some concern” that BPA alters development of the brain, behavior and the prostate gland in children, before and after birth.

Researchers found that BPA levels vary dramatically even between cans of the same product, according to the study, released Tuesday by the National Workgroup for Safe Markets, a coalition of 19 environmental groups. For example, one can of Del Monte French Style Green Beans had 36 micrograms of BPA per serving, while another can of the same product had 138 micrograms per serving — a level that has been linked to changes in prostate cells and increased aggression in animals.

The report calls on Congress to ban BPA in food and drink containers, noting that companies such as Eden Foods already sell vegetables in BPA-free cans; Muir Glenn also plans to begin packaging tomatoes in BPA-free cans this year. Canada and Denmark restrict the use of BPA in certain children’s products, as do five U.S. states, three counties in New York and the city of Chicago, the report says.

The Grocery Manufacturers Association says the report ignores evidence showing BPA is safe.

And there is “no replacement for BPA that will work across the board for all foods,” the association’s Robert Brackett said in a statement. “The performance of any technology that could impact the safety of food or beverages must be proven over the entire shelf life of the product before it can be used.”

Obstetrician Hugh Taylor of Yale University School of Medicine, who wasn’t involved in the new report, says he now advises pregnant patients to avoid canned foods.

“Fresh fruits and vegetables may be more expensive, but I believe that the risk is too high not to spend the extra,” says Taylor, who studies the effect of BPA on prenatal development. “The entire life of that individual may be altered by a few months of BPA exposure in pregnancy. This is where the greatest risk lies. We are programming the hormonal response of the next generation. The worst effects may not become apparent for years.”

Health Care Savings Could Start in the Cafeteria

Steven Burd isn’t a doctor or a medical specialist. But he sure can talk like one.

“I can take any standard diagnostic procedure and there’s typically a five- to tenfold difference in the cost of that identical procedure, whether it’s an M.R.I., CT scan, a diagnostic catheterization, a colonoscopy, you name it,” says Mr. Burd, the chief executive of Safeway.

Four years ago, Mr. Burd, whose grocery chain is the nation’s third largest, became something of health care expert when his company saw a looming financial crisis. In 2005, Safeway was forking over $1 billion a year to provide health insurance for its workers, and the cost was rising 10 percent a year. It was Mr. Burd’s moment of truth: he realized he could no longer stand by as health care costs ballooned.

“We were saying ‘Wow, we’re paying almost twice in health care costs as what we’re making in earnings, and in five years it’s going to be another half a billion dollars,’ ” he recalls.

Similar sticker shock is confronting all kinds of employers, which together provide 160 million Americans with health care coverage. But the cost of delivering that insurance has surged 31 percent over the last five years, representing the fastest-growing single corporate expense, according to Towers Perrin, the management consulting firm. Those costs take a huge bite out of the bottom line and hurt employees, many of whom see their paychecks shrink as employers pass along the extra costs.

Shelly Wolff, head of the health and productivity consulting group at Watson Wyatt, says she has seen C.E.O.’s who’ve dealt adeptly with tough issues like climate change become completely flummoxed by health care. “It’s a board-level deal for most companies,” she says. “A lot of companies are saying ‘What do you do with health care?’ ”

In home offices around Boston, a shoestring operation of three full-time employees is working on an unusual answer to that question. As the wrangling over trillion-dollar price tags continues on Capitol Hill, a start-up company called the Full Yield is undertaking its own version of health care reform by using a simple, low-tech premise: Eat healthier food and you’ll become healthier.

The idea is to help companies move their employees to better diets that, the logic goes, will ultimately reduce their visits to the doctor’s office and the operating room — thus cutting costs.

“We need to put food back in the heart of health care,” says Zoe Finch Totten, Full Yield’s chief executive. “It’s the cheapest way to deal with health and the simplest, and definitely the most pleasurable.”

OVER the last six years, Ms. Totten, an associate at the Jefferson School of Population Health at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia and a nurse midwife by training, has been working to create a 12-month nutritional program different from anything that’s been tried in the workplace before.

Part one of its two-pronged approach is a line of Full Yield-branded food intended to take the guesswork out of what constitutes a healthy diet, while also reducing the need for cooking, which so many workers say they have no time for. Consisting of fresh items made with natural, whole ingredients, the food will be sold in corporate cafeterias and in the prepared-foods section of local supermarkets.

Unlike most corporate nutrition and weight-loss programs, which offer predictable prescriptions about portion size and calorie control, Ms. Totten’s plan allows employees surprising amounts of free rein in deciding how much to eat. “You can eat when you’re hungry, as much as you want, as long as you pay attention to when you’re full,” she advises. “And then you can eat again whenever you feel hungry.”

This may be music to participants’ ears, but it’s a controversial message that runs counter to the advice of many nutrition and obesity experts.

F. Xavier Pi-Sunyer, director of the New York Obesity Research Center and chief of the division of endocrinology, diabetes and nutrition at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center, says it’s an inappropriate message in a nation full of overeaters. “It just isn’t true that people stop when they should,” says Dr. Pi-Sunyer. “Americans are overriding their satiety signals. So to say eat until you’re satiated is not a helpful health message.”

But Ms. Totten contends that overeating doesn’t result from a nationwide failure to count calories, but from the fact that so many people consume a diet of processed, refined foods. “People overeat Doritos because those foods are designed to trick the body’s beautiful ability to be able to self-regulate,” she said. “When you eat primarily health-supporting foods you will recover those protective mechanisms.”

Those who make that change and join the program are urged to eat Full Yield’s food or their own similarly whole-food-based choices exclusively for at least three months.

Part two of the program involves tracking those employees’ progress by collecting a variety of data about them and partnering with insurers to analyze it.

“A lot of employers are doing these modest and piecemeal efforts at wellness and they have not worked,” said Gary Hirshberg, the chief executive of Stonyfield Farm, a yogurt maker, and a member of Full Yield’s board. “This is a comprehensive health management program with food as the base. And it’s going to save companies a lot of money.”

Groupe Danone, Stonyfield’s parent company, has invested “seven figures” in the Full Yield, according to Mr. Hirshberg.

If Ms. Totten and Mr. Hirshberg are correct, the potential for health care savings is huge. A study in the January-February 2009 issue of the journal Health Affairs concluded that 75 percent of the country’s $2.5 trillion in health care spending has to do with four increasingly prevalent chronic diseases: obesity, Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and cancer. Most cases of these diseases, the report stated, are preventable because they are caused by behaviors like poor diets, inadequate exercise and smoking.

Obesity alone threatens to overwhelm the system. In a recent study, Kenneth Thorpe, chairman of the department of health policy and management at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, found that if trends continued, annual health care costs related to obesity would total $344 billion by 2018, or more than 20 percent of total health care spending. (It now accounts for 9 percent.)

Dr. Thorpe also said that if the incidence of obesity fell to its 1987 level, it would free enough money to cover the nation’s uninsured population.

At first blush, the notion of eating our way out of huge public health challenges like obesity, diabetes and heart disease may seem an overly simplistic and idealistic fix for complex, multifaceted problems. But health experts say that, in fact, an apple a day does keep the doctor away, and that many studies prove it.

Dean Ornish, president of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute in Sausalito, Calif., and a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, says he has spent the better part of two decades doing research showing that diet and lifestyle changes can undo even severe heart disease.

“Within a month, we’ve shown improved blood flow and 90 percent reduction in the frequency of angina,” he says. “And within a year we’ve found that severely blocked arteries became measurably less blocked. We know this stuff works.”

More recently, Dr. Ornish says, he has published research showing that some of those same diet and lifestyle changes can actually turn on genes that prevent disease and turn off those that cause heart disease, as well as prostate and breast cancers.

BUT, of course, persuading people to trade French fries and doughnuts for kale and quinoa is much easier said than done. Market researchers in the food industry have long known that people often say they will eat healthier or exercise more but never get around to it.

In spite of the increased incidence of obesity in American society and in the workplace, 40 percent of large companies surveyed by Watson Wyatt for an April report say that less than 5 percent of their employees participated in workplace weight management programs.

“A lot of us have piles in our homes and our offices that we’ll get to when we can, and changing how you eat is often a bit like that,” says Helen Darling, president of the National Business Group on Health, which represents large employers on health care matters. “I don’t think you could possibly overestimate how hard this stuff is.”

Despite the considerable challenges, there are notable examples of companies that have successfully prodded their workers to become healthier, thus trimming health care costs.

I.B.M., for example, says that from 2005 to 2007 it invested $80 million in what are broadly defined as employee wellness programs, and thereby saved $190 million in health care costs. Some $79 million of that was in fewer medical claims; the rest came from reduced absenteeism and “presenteeism” — a measure of lost productivity when employees are sick on the job. “A relatively small investment can have a big payoff,” says Joyce Young, I.B.M.’s director of well-being.

That was certainly the case for Diane Akin, a product quality manager in I.B.M.’s storage technology division in Tucson. This year, she received $300 in rebates from I.B.M. for completing online programs in physical activity, nutrition and preventive care, courses that inspired her to go on an exercise and nutrition kick.

“I lost 40 pounds and my cholesterol and blood pressure are down,” says Ms. Akin, who is in her mid-50s. “I don’t think I would have done it otherwise. The incentives, all the online support groups and goal-setting and monitoring really helped.”

Ms. Akin added that she was no longer worried about becoming diabetic, a condition that could have hit I.B.M. with an annual bill of as much as $20,000 in treatment costs.

Similar incentive programs at Pitney Bowes have helped it shell out 18 percent less than what the average large employer does in per-capita health care costs, according to Brent Pawlecki, its medical director.

In addition to online programs with financial incentives, as well as smoking-cessation and weight-loss plans, the company’s wellness programs include eight on-site health clinics for treating common illnesses, as well as reduced co-payments on medications for diabetes, asthma, hypertension and breast cancer.

Perhaps the biggest corporate success story is Safeway, a rarity among big employers in that it has kept per-capita health care costs from rising. Annual costs at the chain, based in Pleasanton, Calif., are roughly the same as they were in 2005, when Mr. Burd decided to tackle the issue.

He says Safeway has achieved this leveling by shifting its plan toward cheaper generic drugs and through the company’s voluntary Health Measures plan, in which employees are checked for their weight, blood pressure and cholesterol levels and whether they smoke. For each test that’s passed, workers are rewarded with reductions in their payroll contributions to health care coverage. For individual plans, this can add up to almost $800 a year.

But analysts say Safeway, I.B.M. and Pitney Bowes are exceptions. Aside from chipping away at employee benefits, most employers have not made much of a dent in their health care bills. Although “wellness” and “lifestyle improvement” programs are common — 60 percent of big employers have them — companies continue to pay more and more in medical costs. This year, costs went up 6 percent, on average, according to Watson Wyatt.

IT’S a Thursday morning, and Ms. Totten of the Full Yield is lugging a canvas bag full of fruit scones and a cooler stocked with Greek yogurt parfaits along the streets of Boston. She is on her way to a meeting at one of the company’s first three customers: John Hancock, the life insurance and financial services company.

Ms. Totten usually shows up at these meetings with goody bags of Full Yield food, often containing breakfast, lunch and dinner. Developed by a large food service company and produced at its facility in Connecticut, the choices may include turkey chili, quinoa salads, salmon cakes, chicken tagine, mixed bean wraps and whole-grain peanut butter cookies.

Peter Mongeau, vice president of human resources at John Hancock, has sampled the food many times and calls it “outstanding.”

“For me, it was like going to a fine restaurant,” says Mr. Mongeau, among the 300 employees who will be going on the Full Yield program early next year.

To encourage the purchase of Full Yield food, which is priced at $6 to $7 a meal, employees will get $100 worth of coupons that can be used in John Hancock’s cafeteria and at 18 local Roche Brothers grocery stores.

Another Full Yield pilot customer is the City of Boston. Meredith Weenick, associate director in its office of administration and finance, says she was drawn to the plan’s more scientific components. Employees who volunteer to participate will have seven or eight biometric measurements taken at least three times in the 12-month program.

Some of these measurements — for cholesterol, blood pressure and body mass index — are commonly collected by employers with extensive wellness programs. But other measures chart new territory, by looking at triglycerides; blood glucose; waist circumference; C-reactive protein, which tests for inflammation; and hemoglobin A1C, if someone’s diabetic.

Such data, along with what participants provide in detailed diet diaries and health risk assessments, won’t be accessible to employers. Instead, Full Yield researchers, along with Harvard Pilgrim — which is the insurance company for Hancock and the City of Boston and is a pilot customer itself — will analyze the data against insurance claims to gauge improvements in health.

As part of the program, the Full Yield will give employees access to nutrition coaches by phone, as well as personalized online health pages containing the biometric data, exercise and eating tracking tools and information on things like how to cook whole grains and make salad dressing.

Noting that the pilot programs have yet to start, John Hancock, the City of Boston and Harvard Pilgrim all say they don’t want to reveal specific projections about savings. Ms. Weenick says she thinks that “plenty” of the city’s 750 initial enrollees will lose weight, lower their cholesterol and blood pressure and bolster their overall energy levels.

“We feel certain this will have an effect on our bottom line,” she says, “but it will probably take a few years to get there.”

Judith Frampton, vice president for medical management at Harvard Pilgrim, says that when it offers the Full Yield plan to its 1,100 employees in January, she believes it will succeed in attracting and retaining participants where other programs have failed. That’s because all those unconventionally cheery messages about food consumption will be a source of inspiration, she says.

“I think weight loss is more than likely to be an outcome, but this isn’t really about that,” she says. “It’s about adding things to your life and feeling better psychologically and physically. It’s a hugely important message.”