https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/09/health/baby-food-heavy-metals-legislation-wellness/index.html
US lawmakers plan to introduce a bill Thursday that aims to limit the amount of heavy metals found in baby food through stronger regulation and enforcement by the US Food and Drug Administration.
The fact that there needs to be a bill to stop companies from poisoning babies is just fucking depressing.
I think 'limit' is fine as long as that limit is under levels safe for infant consumption. It's probably not possible to make baby food entirely free of heavy metals because they're basically everywhere. But it is possible to make them with heavy metals under a specific safety threshold.
Getting to 100% in anything is really fucking hard - some shits occasionally going to go wrong and that's unavoidable.
Fun fact there is no safe limit of lead to eat. It's a forever metal so once it is in you it never leaves and will only continue to hurt you.
It’s a forever metal so once it is in you it never leaves and will only continue to hurt you.
Citation desired. All references I'm seeing explicitly state that lead is eventually excreted in urine and feces.
In bones, lead can take 25-30 years to leave the body. Actually, this is true of many types of heavy metal poisoning (and radiation, eg radium), and bone loss as we get older tends to release these compounds. This is part of why they believe there's a delay with ALS and Alzheimers between when you ingest heavy metal and when you actually develop symptoms.
In older adults, the primary source of lead exposure can be endogenous. Excretion of lead is relatively slow, and accumulation is common [31]. During early and middle life, lead is sequestered in the bones, where it replaces calcium in the hydroxyapatite structure [32]. The skeleton contains 70–95% of the body burden of lead where lead can remain for decades [32], which can be exploited for exposure assessment research. Adults experiencing loss of bone mass via osteoporosis release lead into the bloodstream. In older adults, 40–70% of blood lead can be attributed to previous body stores [32]. Lead that entered the body during previous periods of high exposure can become biologically active decades later.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7454042/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0161813X20301352
If we limited use of fossil fuel vehicles on farmland, that would help a lot. The exhaust from tractors along with the bits of tires left in fields etc all put heavy metals in our food supply. As it is, almost all farmland in the US needs bioremediation to reduce heavy metals in their soils.
What’s more depressing is that there have been 2,291 bills and amendments addressing ingredients in baby food since 1951. They range from limits on toxins to excessive additives and sugars. Most fail at introduction thanks to the lobbying power of Nestlé, who owns Gerber.
Business ethics require legislation in the US.
Hey, if baby consumers didn't want heavy metals in their food they'd chose a competitor - the market has signaled that its in favor of poison. /s
Well tbf have the babies submitted a compelling case through the proper channels? Maybe they can peacefully assemble to make a difference.. that's how christians have won their battles
What about that one with 50% more lead, but you don't mind trading a couple of your baby's IQ points for those sweet savings?
Hmm that's a tough trade-off. More developmental disabilities, but is the Value™ really there to justify the decreased cost?
If children wanted higher quality food they would go out and make their own money.
Mine are broke so they'll eat what I feed them.
This is ridiculous! Now how are babies supposed to get their recommended daily value of lead and cadmium?
I don't know, but if you take them to Russia and teach them to say "fuck Putin," they'll get their recommended daily dose of polonium.
Without led in their system, how are we going to develop the next generation of psychopaths and right wing voters?
TIL in the US they need an extra law to limit harmful substances in (baby) food. Normal people would call this "common sense", but it seems to be rather uncommon in the US.
The FDA was supposed to just be regulating this as their job already. I'm not sure why they need a specific law, but I'm just going to assume the answer is Reagan.
If the FDA, FTC, USDA, EPA, Depts of Transportation, and CDC wanted to guarantee and check their work, we’d have universal healthcare. And in fact I think that’s exactly the legal argument for why the government should be FORCED to provide us healthcare - how else would we be able to catch (and class action sue for) large community-wide health hazards such as:
-asbestos in baby powder
-lead and heavy metals in vitamins and supplements
-consistency of dosing in medications
-Deaths from auto accidents when we should be having trains
-Deaths from contaminated eggs, meat, milk from bird flu or other pathogens
-Products that are blatant lies/false
-Companies leaking chemicals into water supplies
-Lead in water supply
-Heavy metals in water supply& in crops, from exhaust from cars and bits of tires
-imminent looming climate change
Gee, I wonder why corporations are scared of us getting healthcare?
I am genuinely surprised that this isn't already in place for all foods. We've known about the harm they cause for a very long time.
Was it introduced by Biden? If so, it's dead on arrival as conservatives will do anything to prevent him from getting a win.
Klobuchar, Krishnamoorthi, Duckworth, and Cárdenas. All Democratic senators.
It was originally put forth by Krishnamoorthi late last year.
