Ethylene Oxide/Sterigenics Updates

Articles Tagged with McDonald’s

hamburger-gb0d465128_1920-300x225It’s common knowledge that fast food isn’t the most nutritious dining option, but you should at least be able to expect that the hamburger or chicken nuggets you are devouring are nontoxic. That may not be the case, say researchers at George Washington University. A new study published in the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology has revealed that most of the food items at popular fast-food restaurants are full of chemicals known as phthalates that have been linked to a host of health problems. This is the first study to measure phthalates directly in fast food and contributes to the scientific evidence linking fast food consumption to higher levels of phthalates.

What Chemicals Did the Researchers Find?

Researchers at George Washington University bought 64 popular menu options from Burger King, Chipotle, Domino’s, McDonald’s, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell and tested them for 8 common phthalates and 3 replacement plasticizers. 10 of the 11 chemicals were present at high levels in nearly all of the samples. 81% of the samples contained DnBP and 70% contained DEHP; both phthalates have been linked to fertility and reproductive issues as well as increased risks of behavioral, learning, and attention disorders in children. 86% of the samples contained DEHT, a plasticizer that is being used as a replacement for phthalates. Overall, samples that contained meat had significantly higher levels of phthalates than vegetarian options; but phthalates were still present in both types of food.

McDonalds--300x293 Eating fast food wrapped in PFAS laden food packaging may be a one-two punch for your prostate. A new study conducted by scientists at the University of Illinois has found that PFAS exposure together with a high-fat diet causes malignant prostate tumors to grow much faster than those without exposure to the chemical.

The scientists in the study performed several experiments. In one they exposed malignant human prostate cells to PFOS and PFBS and compared them to malignant prostate cells that were not exposed.  The cancerous cells replicated three times faster than the control group when exposed to PFOS and 5 times faster when exposed to PFBS.

In a follow-up experiment, they injected mice with the malignant human prostate cells and fed them either a high-fat diet or a control diet. Some of the mice also received doses of PFOS, a common form of PFAS that has previously been linked to cancer. As expected, the mice fed a high-fat diet exhibited faster tumor growth than mice in the control group. The mice exposed to PFOS who ate the control diet had even faster tumor growth than the mice fed a high-fat diet. But the mice who were exposed to PFOS and fed a high-fat diet had the fastest rate of tumor growth of all.

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