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Re: Cancer Update
10/31/2006 10:55:30 PM
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Hi Nick. Something about the subject of this thread has been nagging at me for a while, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. Then I remembered. It's a complete fake. A hoax. Here's the info: http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/cookplastic.aspClaim: Research has proved that microwaving foods in plastic containers releases cancer-causing agents into the foods.
Example: [Collected via e-mail, 2002]
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Info for the Health Conscious
Dioxin Carcinogens causes cancer. Especially breast cancer. Don't
freeze your plastic water bottles with water as this also releases
dioxin in the Plastic.
On Channel 2 this morning. They had a Dr. Edward
Fujimoto from Castle Hospital on the program. He is the manager of the
Wellness Program at the hospital. He was talking about dioxins and how
bad they are for us. He said that we should not be heating our food in
the microwave using plastic containers. This applies to foods that
contain fat. He said that the combination of fat, high heat and
plastics releases dioxins into the food and ultimately into the cells
of the body. Dioxins are carcinogens and highly toxic to the cells of
our bodies. Instead, he recommends using glass, Corning Ware, or
ceramic containers for heating food. You get the same results without
the dioxins. So such things as TV dinners, instant saimin and soups,
etc. should be removed from the container and heated in something else.
Paper isn't bad but you don't know what is in the paper. Just
safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc. He said we might
remember when some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the
foam containers to paper. The dioxin problem is one of the reasons.
Pass this on to your family and friends.
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Variations:
- In early 2004 the following paragraph was added to the beginning of the message quoted above:
Johns Hopkins Newsletter
Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in their newsletters.
This information is being circulated At Walter Reed Army Medical
Center. Dioxin Carcinogens cause cancer. Especially breast cancer.
Don't freeze plastic water bottles with water in them as this also
releases dioxin from the plastic. Dr. Edward from Castle hospital was on a TV program explaining this health hazard. He is the manager....
- In November 2004, this message was combined with another piece about the purported dangers of lead-containing lipstick.
Origins: This
"health alert" began appearing in people's inboxes in February 2002; the "Channel 2" reference indicates it was someone's summarization of a short morning news health segment aired on KHON-TV
in Hawaii on 23 January
2002, which was then forwarded all over the Internet as "important
health information."
One- or two-minute health spots on local news programs are not ideal
sources of medical information, however. While important basic
information can be imparted in such a format, trying to explicate
complex medical topics in a minute or two can easily mislead or confuse
viewers, many of whom come away believing absolutely whatever they've
heard (or think they've heard) because "a doctor on TV said it was true" — in this case an unshakeable belief that using plastic containers in microwave ovens causes
cancer.
That a doctor (or, more accurately, someone bearing the title "Dr.")
appears on TV does not mean he's a leading practitioner in his field;
it generally means only that he has something to say that a news
director considers newsworthy, accurate or not. (The "Dr. Edward
Fujimoto" identified in this piece is not a staff physician from
"Castle Hospital" or a medical doctor; he's a Ph.D. serving as director
of the Center for Health Promotion
at Castle Medical Center in Kailua, Hawaii.) What TV news covers is
dictated by ratings, not importance, and sensational claims get better
ratings than straightforward, mundane information, even if the latter
is more valuable to the viewing audience. It's a pretty good assumption
that if using plastic containers in microwaves — as millions of people have been doing for decades — posed a significant risk of cancer, you'd be hearing about it somewhere other than an e-mail forward of an anonymous summary of a morning news spot on a Hawaiian television station.
Is there really something to the central claim of this e-mail,
that heating plastic in microwaves releases a cancer-causing agent into
the food? It's within the realm of possibility that substances used
during the manufacturing process of plastics could leak into food
during the heating process, but research isn't conclusive about the
potential for danger (if any) posed by such a phenomenon, and the FDA
already imposes stringent regulations on plastic containers meant for
microwaving as a preventive measure.
Dr. Rolf Halden of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health advises:
In general,
whenever you heat something you increase the likelihood of pulling
chemicals out. Chemicals can be released from plastic packaging
materials like the kinds used in some microwave meals. If you are
cooking with plastics or using plastic utensils, the best thing to do
is to follow the directions and only use plastics that are specifically
meant for cooking. Inert containers are best, for example
heat-resistant glass, ceramics and good old stainless steel.
As for concerns about dioxins being released by freezing water in plastic bottles, Dr. Halden says:
This is an urban
legend. There are no dioxins in plastics. In addition, freezing
actually works against the release of chemicals. Chemicals do not
diffuse as readily in cold temperatures, which would limit chemical
release if there were dioxins in plastic, and we don't think there are.
Several months after this piece began to circulate, it was
merged with a similar item describing a seventh-grade student's science
project:
As a seventh grade
student, Claire Nelson learned that di-ethyl-hexyl-adepate (DEHA),
considered a carcinogen, is found in plastic wrap. She also learned
that the FDA had never studied the effect of microwave cooking on
plastic-wrapped food. Claire began to wonder: "Can cancer-causing
particles seep into food covered with household plastic wrap while it
is being microwaved?"
Three years later, with encouragement from her high school
science teacher, Claire set out to test what the FDA had not. Although
she had an idea for studying the effect of microwave radiation on
plastic-wrapped food, she did not have the equipment. Eventually, Jon
Wilkes at the National Center for Toxicological Research in Jefferson,
Arkansas, agreed to help her. The research center, which is affiliated
with the FDA, let her use its facilities to perform her experiments,
which involved microwaving plastic wrap in virgin olive oil. Claire
tested four different plastic wraps and "found not just the carcinogens
but also xenoestrogen was migrating [into the oil]...." Xenoestrogens
are linked to low sperm counts in men and to breast cancer in women.
Throughout her junior and senior years, Claire made a couple of trips each week to the research center, which was 25 miles from her home, to work on her experiment.
An article in Options reported that "her analysis found that DEHA was migrating into the oil at between 200 parts and 500 parts per million. The FDA standard is 0.05 parts
per billion." Her summarized results have been published in science
journals. Claire Nelson received the American Chemical Society's top
science prize for students during her junior year and fourth place at
the International Science and Engineering Fair (Fort Worth, Texas) as a
senior. "Carcinogens-At 10,000,000 Times FDA Limits" Options May 2000.
Published by People Against Cancer, 515-972-4444.
To add to this: Saran wrap placed over foods as they are
nuked, with the high heat, actually drips poisonous toxins into the
food. Use a paper towel instead.
This gist of this latter addition is true in that a student
named Claire Nelson did perform the experiment described for a school
science fair project back in 1997 (she came up with the idea
for the project while she was in seventh grade, but as noted, she
didn't actually conduct the experiment until three years later) by
working with an FDA-affiliated laboratory. Like the Fujimoto piece,
however, the claims made in this version tend towards the alarmist: the
results of the experiment described tended to indicate that
diethylhexyl adipate (DEHA) and xenoestrogens could migrate from
plastic wraps into microwaved food (specifically olive oil, the "food"
used in the experiment), but only with some brands of plastic
wrap (primarily ones not sold as "microwave-safe") and only when the
plastic wrap was in direct contact with the food being heated;
moreover, no research has yet demonstrated that DEHA poses a
significant cancer risk to humans at the levels noted here (even though
they exceed FDA standards) or that xenoestrogens are a direct cause of breast cancer in women or reduced sperm counts in men.
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