Avoid These Dangerous Grocery Foods

Do you always rely on your local grocery to provide you with the basic food items? You should be careful, because some foods you frequently buy may be detrimental to your health. When Food Matters asked seven experts which supermarket foods they would never buy, they answered:

• Canned tomatoes – An endocrinologist says that the cans used for canned tomatoes are lined with a resin containing BPA. The acid from the tomatoes break down the BPA in dangerous amounts.
• Conventional beef – Unlike grass-fed beef that has important vitamins, minerals, and anti-inflammatory fats, conventional cattle are fed corn, grain, and soy that make them fat and unhealthy.
• Microwave popcorn – Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) is found in the lining of microwave popcorn bags. When heated, this compound leaches into the food. PFOA has been linked to infertility.
• Conventional potatoes – Did you know that many potato growers only eat potatoes grown on plots separate from the potatoes they sell? This is because the non-organic potatoes they sell are heavily sprayed with pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides.
• Farmed salmon – A scientific study showed that salmon and other farmed fish had high levels of carcinogens like PCBs and DDT. These fish are stuffed into cramped pens and thrive on an unhealthy diet of chicken feathers and pellets.
• Conventional milk – Dairy cows are given growth hormones to maximize milk production. Unfortunately, these increase the incidence of udder infection and pus in the milk.
• Conventional apples – They are frequently doused with pesticides that are linked to Parkinson’s disease. (Read the full article here.)

Dr. Joseph Mercola says that aside from these products, there are other grocery foods you should avoid. For example, many fruits and vegetables, like berries, are also highly-sprayed with pesticides. Unlike apples that can be peeled, berries are usually eaten with their chemical-laced skin still intact.

Why You Should Avoid Genetically Modified Foods

Dr. Mercola says genetically modified (GM) foods are among the most dangerous foods in our supply today. They can put you at an increased risk of certain diseases, infertility, and birth defects. Popular GM crops today include:

• Corn
• Soy
• Canola
• Cottonseed
• Alfalfa
• Sugar from sugar beets
• Zucchini
• Crookneck squash
• Hawaiian papaya

If you want to avoid GM foods effectively, don’t buy products with soy, corn, canola, and any of their derivatives as an ingredient, unless they’re labeled USDA 100% Organic.

The Dangers of Fructose and Artificial Sweeteners

Even though conventional health experts say that consuming fructose or sugar moderately is okay, Dr. Mercola disagrees. Excessive sugar, especially in the form of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), is the primary factor that causes obesity and chronic and lethal diseases. Almost all processed foods sold today contain fructose. The number one source of calories in the U.S. today is HFCS in soda.

Because HFCS prevails in many foods and beverages, the average person now consumes one-third of a pound of sugar daily. This is at least five ounces or 150 grams, half of which is fructose.

But once you decide to cut down on sugar and fructose, you should not replace it with artificially sweetened foods and beverages. Just like HFCS, artificial sweeteners are also found abundantly in processed foods. More than 6,000 products today contain aspartame.

Foods and beverages with artificial sweeteners not only ruin your body’s ability to count calories, they also increase your risk of weight gain. They can also cause negative health effects like intestinal damage, diabetes, pre-term delivery, brain damage, and cancer. Acesulfame potassium or Acesulfame-K, another artificial sweetener, is linked to kidney tumors.

Diet Water: This Beverage is Slowly Poisoning You

Flavored water, zero-calorie water, and other “enhanced” water products may be marketed as healthy, but they’re not. For example, the latest water enhancement product found in the market, called MiO, contains three dyes, two artificial sweeteners, one preservative, and propylene glycol (PG). PG is a solvent that can potentially cause cell mutations and damage your liver, skin, and kidney damage if ingested in excessive amounts.

Enhanced water products also contain large amounts of sugar and fructose. Every 20-ounce bottle of Coca-Cola’s Glaceau VitaminWater contains 33 grams of sugar—that’s only six grams less than a can of Coke. Meanwhile, VitaminWater’s crystalline fructose may be the worst kind of fructose you can consume, and is likely more harmful than HFCS. Crystalline fructose is 99 percent fructose, while HFCS is only 55 percent fructose.

The Dangers of Processed Meat

Hotdogs, deli meats, bacon, and pepperoni have dangerous compounds like heterocyclic amines (HCAs), a potent carcinogen. Other harmful ingredients include sodium nitrite, Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs), and Advanced Glycation End Products (AGEs). AGEs can increase your risk of heart and kidney disease, and diabetes.

Processed meat can also increase your risk of cancer, especially bowel cancer. A previous analysis from the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) reported that eating just one sausage a day increases your risk of bowel, bladder, stomach, and pancreatic cancer (link).

If you want to eat processed meat every once in a while, look for:

• “Uncured” varieties that have no nitrates
• Varieties that say 100 percent beef or 100 percent chicken. You’ll know that the meat comes from a single species and does not include byproducts (like chicken fat or chicken skin).
• Products that don’t have HFCS, preservatives, MSG, and artificial flavors or colors

If possible, buy sausages and other processed meat from small, local farmers who will let you know exactly what’s in their products.

Next time you do your grocery shopping, watch out for these dangerous products. Your health depends on what you put in your shopping cart.

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Tags: aspartame, dr. joseph mercola, grocery foods, HFCS, high fructose corn syrup, processed meat, supermarket foods