Arsenic in Rice, Organic food not being more nutritious, and sensationalism by the media

If you happen to follow news either on print or on TV you would not have missed the reports on arsenic in rice and about organic food not having more nutrients. While it is good to inform the public of health related news, they should be careful in scaring the public by not providing the whole story.

The first one was related to a recent study by the consumer reports magazine on arsenic levels in rice. If you go to the details of the report from consumer reports, they mention that use of arsenic based fertilizers is rampant in any agriculture, including fruits, vegetables and animal farming. Besides, we have arsenic in our ground water too. One big flaw in the reports is that it talked about arsenic in rice as if arsenic was only present in rice, what about other foods? Has the study been done on other types of food, say corn? Such a study would be quashed by the corn industry as it wields huge power. I am not stating that corn contains more arsenic than rice, but we do not know that either. Rice cannot be so bad, if that was the case about 4 billion Asians, who make up two-thirds of the world population, would not have survived over generations :-). So maybe there is some truth to the reports, but it cannot be a problem with rice per se and there could be other factors

So here are some facts that I found to be useful in the context of the media reports and can help people from giving up on rice altogether.

·         The U.S. is the world’s leading user of arsenic, and since 1910 about 1.6 million tons have been used for agricultural and industrial purposes

·         Arsenic is used on vegetables, fruits and animal farming as well, and it is found in drinking water too. Hence it is found in small quantities in many food varieties.

·         Arsenic levels on rice grown in the southern states were higher than from other areas, and it is the southern states that are the main rice growing states in the US .

·         Arsenic was widely used for cotton crops, and most of the cotton in the US was grown in the southern states. So you see the connection with the above point…

·         Organic rice has relatively less levels of arsenic, again this can vary based on the area of cultivation.

·         Rice grown abroad has a much lower level of arsenic, again because of the difference in soil, ground water and fertilizers used.

·         The arsenic levels on all foods will increase based on the arsenic levels in soil, and rice might have a higher absorption as it is grown in water flooded conditions.

                       

So should we be concerned about the study? Yes.., but don’t be alarmed. If you are an Asian, you are most likely to buy rice grown in an Asian country and the levels should be lower than rice grown in the US. Also, try to use organic food if possible as it does not use fertilizers directly, but we cannot escape what is present in the soil due to previous fertilizer use over a sustained period. So do due diligence, but go back and enjoy that morsel of rice. So will I… :-)

On to the 2^nd topic, and a very important one. The story that was all over the media world said that there is little evidence that organic foods have more nutrition than conventionally grown foods. This was based on a study by researchers at Stanford University.  The media and the researchers got this all wrong, we don’t need PhD’s to know that organic foods might not be more nutritious when you just look at the vitamin content :-). What they missed is what negative impacts do the conventional foods have with higher chemicals, via pesticides/fertilizers. This is predominantly why most people take organic foods. The lead author of the study Crystal Smith-Spangler writes in the Annals of Internal Medicine that "Despite the widespread misperception that organically produced foods are more nutritious than conventional alternatives, we did not find evidence to support this perception." Mr Smith-Spangler, now who told you that we eat organic food under the same misconception that you speak of, on the contrary I had never even thought about it. Instead we take it for the following reasons:

·         To reduce exposure to toxic chemicals via heavy use of pesticides and fertilizers used in conventional farming.

·         To reduce/eliminate exposure to hormones and antibiotics that are used in conventional farming (especially animal products).

·         Better tasting food, and food in its natural form. Try organic fruits and you will know the difference.

·         It is better for the environment in more ways than one, including providing local communities good drinking water due to the soil not having the pesticides/fertilizers.

Apart from the points above, there is the question of huge health risks to the society due to conventional farming. Organic food can help to improve the overall health of people in the country and reducing healthcare costs in the long run, this does not affect an individual, but collectively can be big.

Some of the health risks include:

·         Increase of diseases like cancer due to the presence of chemicals in our body

·         Increase of new super viruses and new strains, especially due to factory based animal farming, a good example is the H1N1 (or swine flu as we know it) epidemic.

·         Impact of hormones on kids development, including early puberty especially for girls

Now the study looked at just the vitamin content and ignored the rest of the positives of organic food. They did make a few passing suggestions on the positives without delving into the details and did not care to analyze them too, and the media promptly ignored them as it would not be sensational. One of the suggestions in the study was that eating organic foods can reduce the likelihood of consuming pesticides and antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Hmm, just ‘can’ J, but they did not care to test on them. Which leads to the question, was the research sponsored by vested interests? They also reported a 33% increase in the risk of consuming antibiotic-resistant bacteria in conventionally raised chicken or pork compared with their organic counterparts, again just as a side note. They also note that no long-term studies has been done of the health outcomes for people consuming organic versus conventionally produced food, maybe it is time to do that too.

The point I am making is not to say everyone should move to organic food, it is for every person to decide what works best for them and their family. I think it is better for everyone in the short term and more so in the long term, and that is just my opinion based on what I read and experience. The reports by the media to discourage people from taking organic food came at a crucial time as there was a significant movement towards organic food and helping a lot of local communities. I hope they do not succeed in their attempt in the long run, even though they might have slowed the momentum to a certain extent.  What was surprising was that reputed media including NY Times had this reported on its main page, so did CNN (but that was not a surprise). It looks like they are looking for attention grabbing headlines without thinking of the consequences. I guess these days we cannot just read the headlines and get the story, the media is forcing us to read the entire story and do more research on the topics by their incompetent reporting that is just interested in the number of clicks and eye balls.

-Ramanuja Iyer



PS: Looks like NY-Times is following iVichar :-), checkout the new article that came out on the 2nd of Oct:
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/02/that-flawed-stanford-study/?hp

Hmm, what shall I say :-)

Unrest over a stupid video...

Unrest over a stupid video - Radicals calling the shorts on both sides, time for the moderates to step in…

The turn of events in the middle-east and in other parts of the world has been very disturbing. Quite clearly the agenda has been hijacked by radicals and has been transformed into a dangerous narrative to the ill-informed. How else can one explain the brutal killing of ambassador Stevens who has been a friend and supporter to the Arab world. The fact is that the movie was made by a bigot just for attention, and it had quite rightly fallen into the intended hands and got the desired effect.

In places where the protests happen, they react as if the American government was behind the video. It is as if telling that the Saudi government was behind the Sept 11 attack because Osama was a Saudi citizen. The idiot who took the movie is an unknown in the US, and so was his stupid video. None had even heard of it and there was absolutely no coverage in the news. The US government, and more so the president, has much more to worry, trying to get the economy moving and on his own re-election bid. On the same tone, the vast majority within the US does not subscribe to such nonsense, but then people want to listen just to the minority to which they cannot connect and then further more they end up reacting to it.

The irony is that the other set of idiots who reacted like mad men to this video has only done more harm to their religion and added credence to the movie. Little do they know that the US has a very tolerant society and religious freedom as well, unlike what the propaganda is out there in the Islamic world. People from all over the world are free to practice their religion, which includes various types of Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists and many others. This includes more than 2000 mosques in the US. One cannot imagine practicing their religion freely on many places where we have seen this violence. Well, you can’t do this even in China where there is a tight lid on religion and they have dealt with Islamic fundamentalism in some provinces in a very harsh manner, of course behind the iron curtain J.  

I know of quite a few Muslims in the US who are here because they have more freedom and comfort than in their own countries. My intent is not to speak high of the US, and yes there are a lot of negatives too, especially with the bitter taste left over from the Bush years. Having said that,  little do these people know that the US is the single largest donor for helping the poor and hungry in all parts of the world, through UN and outside of it. This is not just from the government, but from private donors as well. In fact, the very people who protest, whether from Libya, Yemen, Egypt, Pakistan, etc.. may have all benefited from US aid to these countries.

What added fuel to the fire was the fact that none of the leaders of the nations where the riots have happened have come out in the open to criticize violence and try to impart sense by stating that what they are doing is damaging the religion and the country more. It would do a lot of good if the moderates in the Islamic world come out openly against violence of all sorts and project their good side. Most Muslims are peace loving and are not the face of Islam as the world know it now, it would do justice to them too if the moderates take control. It would also do a lot of good if people pay less attention to bigots and their actions, and instead try to find common ground. Imagine what would have happened if the people who saw the movie ignored it, would it not have been a slap in the face to the idiots who made it.

Finally, a comment on a company that I like a lot. Google (and YouTube) should have done better on this topic, free speech is needed, but to be a medium through which hate spreads does not qualify as free speech. ‘Don’t be evil’ also means you don’t spread evil thoughts and cause more evil actions. The world we live in is not perfect, so the term free speech must have a limit. We say the sky is the limit, and even the sky is not infinite…

-Ramanuja Iyer