Almost all baby food sold in the US is found to be contaminated with neurotoxic and sometimes carcinogenic heavy metals. Sounding the alarm is Healthy Babies Bright Futures (HBBF), an organization that brings together scientists and agencies committed to protecting children’s health. As a result of a special study, of which follows.
Heavy metals in baby food, the US study
The study
What’s in My Baby’s Food
covers 13 categories of baby foods. Cereals, fruits, vegetables, juices, and snacks, among others. That is, the foods most commonly consumed by young children. HBBF subjected 168 products from 61 brands to laboratory sampling and analysis, measuring their levels of arsenic, cadmium, lead and mercury.
The result is worrisome. Just 9 foods are free of heavy metals. At least one of the 4 toxic substances researched is present in 95% of the products. And 1 in 4 products (26%) contains all of them.
The greatest risks are found on rice products due to thehigh concentration of inorganicarsenic. As many as 4 out of 7 of the cereals with rice analyzed contain more than the 100 ppb (parts per billion) limit. Almost all samples belonging to this food category, as if that were not enough, revealed the presence of all 4 heavy metals tested.
Fruit juices (100 percent apple and grape), carrots, and sweet potatoes, themselves consumed regularly by children, were found to be severely contaminated with arsenic. Albeit to a lesser extent than in the past. In fact, the current levels of arsenic contamination in rice and juice are lower (-37 and -63%, respectively) than those found in similar survey conducted 10 years ago.
In contrast, lead exceeds the maximum limit of 1 ppb in 83% of the foods tested. And in 1 in 5 cases it exceeds it by 10 times.
The toxic effects on children’s brains
The 4 heavy metals covered in the report are all neurotoxic. They can damage the baby’s brain and nervous system as early as the prenatal stage. With effects ranging from behavioral problems-such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)-to permanent loss of intellectual capacity.
Exposure to these substances during early childhood is linked to loss of IQ (Intellectual Quotient). The scientific literature on this subject has been established for decades. At least 23 studies, published in the past seven years, offer me further confirmation. The study under review moreover shows the ubiquitousness in early childhood foods of the three most prevalent heavy metals (lead, arsenic and cadmium), to which every child could therefore be exposed on a daily basis.
The intellectual impairment in U.S. infants (0-24 months) exposed to arsenic and lead in food was estimated, in total, to be the loss of more than 11 million IQ points. This harm is attributed to the extent of 20% to foods containing rice alone. An additional 35 percent of the harm is then attributed to 14 other foods regularly consumed by children.
Other serious health effects attributed to heavy metal exposure include.
– type 2 diabetes,
– heart disease,
– some cancers,
– reproductive difficulties, into adulthood.
Reduce exposure to heavy metals by 80%.
Heavy metals-which occur naturally in soil and water-increase with spills of pesticides and herbicides, industrial waste and air pollution. On the fields, they are absorbed by crops and end up in food. Some plants are more prone to uptake than others. Rice, for example, absorbs about 10 times more arsenic in comparison with other grains.
To reduce children’s exposure to heavy metals in food, HBBF suggests some simple solutions. Namely.
– vary the child’s diet (since repetitive consumption exposes accumulation),
– Limit consumption of the highest-risk foods. Broad-leaved vegetables as well as tubers and roots (such as potatoes and carrots) absorb heavy metals from the soil more than other vegetables,
– Choose organic foods, presumably grown in less polluted soils,
– Replace the 5 foods at greatest risk of contamination with others less prone to such risk, as the table below indicates.
Professional journalist since January 1995, he has worked for newspapers (Il Messaggero, Paese Sera, La Stampa) and periodicals (NumeroUno, Il Salvagente). She is the author of journalistic surveys on food, she has published the book "Reading labels to know what we eat".