Food Additives and their Dangers

Why is man always trying to improve on nature?

Whether you believe in an intelligent creator, or blind luck it seems to be common sense that something that has worked for thousands of years should be left alone, but mankind as a whole doesn’t seem to think that way. Let’s look at some of the manmade substitutes and the issues they cause.

MSG – Monosodium Glutamate is a food additive that makes you think the food tastes better. I say makes you think because it doesn’t actually change anything about the food; it just triggers brain cells to make you think it does. Now studies are showing that this triggering process causes problems. Those problems are things like headaches, migraines, muscle spasms, nausea, rashes, anaphylaxis (trouble breathing that can lead to death) seizures, depression, and heart irregularities. It has also been shown to cause damage to the nervous system.

One thing that makes it hard to avoid MSG is that there are so many terms that can be substituted for the acronym.

They include:
Autolyzed yeast
Calcium caseinate
Dry milk powder
Dry milk protein
Gelatin
Glutamate
Glutamic acid
Hydrolyzed corn gluten
Hydrolyzed soy protein
Hydrolyzed wheat protein
Hydrolyzed oat flour
Hydrolyzed protein
Hydrolyzed plant protein
Hydrolyzed vegetable protein
Monopotassium glutamate
Monosodium glutamate
Natrium glutamate
Plant protein extract
Sodium caseinate
Textured protein
Yeast extract
Yeast food
Yeast nutrient

That’s a long list, but it doesn’t stop there. Here is another list they may also indicate the presence of MSG, or may not:

Barley malt
Bouillon Broth
Carrageenan
Citric acid
Corn Starch
Corn Syrup
Enzymes
Flavors/Flavoring
High Fructose Corn Syrup
Maltodextrin
Malt extract
Malted Barley
Malt flavoring
Natural chicken flavoring
Natural beef flavoring
Natural flavors/flavor/flavoring
Natural pork flavoring
Pectin
Protein fortified food
Seasonings
Soy protein isolate
Soy protein or soy protein concentrate
Soy sauce
Spices
Stock
Ultra-pasteurized
Whey
Whey protein
Whey protein concentrate
Whey protein isolate

An easy way to avoid MSG is to shop exclusively in the produce and meat sections. Even the dairy section of your grocery store isn’t safe anymore.

That may work for MSG, but it won’t work for the next manmade food additive. That additive is called glyphosate. This chemical keeps your body from cleaning itself out. This leaves the people that eat it with a buildup of heavy metals, carcinogens, plastics, and pesticides that their bodies would normally be able to clean out. Glyphosate does this by throws off the cytochrome P450 gene pathway, inhibiting enzyme production in the body. These enzymes play a crucial role in detoxifying xenobiotics, which include drugs, carcinogens, and pesticides, as well as other crucial body functions including creating the hormones we need, allowing us to digest our food properly, even protecting us from dementia and obesity. This chemical is inside any food that has come in contact with Monsanto’s Roundup. Besides not using it around the home the only other way to avoid it is to eat only organic produce. Another food additive we need to avoid is BPA. This one isn’t purposely added to our foods, but is leeched into them from multiple sources. These include any plastics our food and water come in contact, including the plastic liners of our canned foods. It also includes the plastics our foods come in contact with inside our homes. Babies are very susceptible to the damaging effects of BPA and similar chemicals. But they are the ones most likely to come into contact with it. Everything from the plastic bottles, plastic nipples, plastic cups and silverware to the plastics that waterproof their mattresses are sources of BPA. The problem with this chemical and its cousins is that it disrupts the endocrine system. This system is what regulates our hormones. Our hormones tell us how feminine or masculine we are supposed to be. They also prepare us, even from birth, for reproduction later in life. Reports are saying we are already in an infertility epidemic in our country.

If this list isn’t already long enough we need to include growth stimulators such as ractopine as well as antibiotics. These are fed to meat animals so that they grow faster. They are also doing the same to the humans that eat that meat, eat those eggs, or drink that milk.

Fluoride is also an unintentional food additive that is sometimes used intentionally. If you water your otherwise organic garden the plants will pick up and retain some of that fluoride. But the real problem is that big agriculture has found that Fluoride-based pesticide chemicals are commonly used on non-organic food crops because they are highly effective at both killing pests and protecting crops against pest damage. If it is that good at killing why would we want to put it into our bodies?

We aren’t going to touch on the artificial sugar substitutes, the GMO foods, or the phosphoric acid in our sodas. Those are complete topics in and of themselves and need a lot more room than we can spare today. Just know that these are also things we want to avoid if we want to live a healthy life.

The best way to be the best you can be, is to become a food detective. Know where your food came from and what has been put into it.