Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 beta 3/9/83; site menlo70.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!menlo70!sanders From: sanders@menlo70.UUCP (Rex Sanders) Newsgroups: net.cooks,net.veg,net.med Subject: Re: irradiated food Message-ID: <199@menlo70.UUCP> Date: Sun, 26-Feb-84 15:13:10 EST Article-I.D.: menlo70.199 Posted: Sun Feb 26 15:13:10 1984 Date-Received: Fri, 2-Mar-84 13:28:23 EST References: <544@shark.UUCP> Organization: USGS, Menlo Park CA Lines: 32 Everything I've read on the subject indicates that radioactive food is not the worry - it's the chemical changes in the food caused by the high-energy radiation blasting in. (There is some fancy name for these "byproducts", but I can't recall it now.) Basically, the same mechanism involved with producing cancer in living tissue. The main concern about these byproducts is their toxicity or carcinogenicity (whew!). The ammount and types of byproducts identified so far inidicate no danger from direct toxicity. All the studies are not yet conclusive on the cancer-causing effects, because the state of the art in detecting and evaluating these chemicals has advanced so rapidly recently - i.e. 20 years of studies are not necessarily relevant to this problem. Another thing to consider is *who* conducted the studies. I'm not referring to the usual claims of conflict of interest. The scandals surrounding several of the "independent" testing labs (IBT comes quickly to mind) indicate that healthy scepticism is warranted of any studies done by 1 or 2 labs, especially if the studies disagree. Can anyone quote studies with sources that touch on the byproducts & carcinogen problem? One more thing to consider - if the food irradiating industry has anything like the safety track record of the rest of the food industry, how many workers will suffer from improper handling of the Cobalt-60? How many shavings from those rods will fall off into the food? How will those rods be shipped and stored all over the country if this becomes a large industry? -- Rex