Our Corporate Masters Are Poisoning Us And Making Us Sick-- For Quick Profits

Let me take a break from the election for a minute-- at least in terms of politicians. There were also food policy issues on the ballot around the country. The results were mixed.

Colorado Proposition 105: This statewide ballot initiative pushed for the labeling of genetically modified foods, requiring most GM foods to bear a label reading "produced with genetic engineering." Burrito chain Chipotle and Whole Foods came out in support of the measure, while agribusiness giants Monsanto, PepsiCo, and Kraft came out against it. (Unsurprisingly, 105's opponents raised more than $12 million-- many times what supporters brought in.) Outcome: Colorado voters resoundingly rejected Prop 105, with nearly 70 percent of voters voting no.

Oregon Measure 92: This ballot measure was nearly identical to Colorado's, requiring foods with GMO ingredients to be labeled. Like in Colorado, Big Ag mobilized big-time against Measure 92, raising more than $16 million. But 92's supporters-- including Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps-- raised an impressive $8 million. Outcome: Oregon voters barely rejected the measure-- just over half voted no. The narrow defeat means there are no GMO labeling laws in place anywhere in the country.

San Francisco Measure E and Berkeley Measure D: These two Bay Area cities both considered levying taxes on sugary beverages. San Francisco's Measure E proposed a 2 cent per ounce tax, while Berkeley's Measure D proposed 1 cent per ounce. Both races were considered something of a last stand for the soda tax-- if it couldn't pass in these two bastions of liberalism and healthy living, it was essentially doomed everywhere else. No surprise, then, that Big Soda spent more than $7 million in San Francisco and some $2.1 million in Berkeley (population: 117,000) to defeat the measures. Outcome: Failing to gain the necessary two-thirds supermajority, the San Francisco soda tax failed. Berkeley's passed overwhelmingly, with 75 percent voting yes.

Maui County, Hawaii, GMO Moratorium Bill: Hawaii's Maui County-- which includes the islands of Maui, Lanai, and Molokai-- considered one of the strongest anti-GMO bills ever: a complete moratorium on the cultivation of genetically engineered crops until studies conclusively prove they are safe. Agriculture is big business on Maui: The island is a major producer of sugarcane, coffee, and pineapple, among other things. Monsanto is among the companies operating farms in Maui County, and this bill would've effectively shut it down. (Under the law, farmers knowingly cultivating GMOs would get hit with a $50,000 per day fine.) Opponents raised nearly $8 million against the measure, making it the most expensive campaign in state history. Outcome: Maui citizens approved the temporary ban, with 50 percent voting yes.

Here in my own super-progressive Los Angeles district, grassroots independent, Steve Stokes, ran against corporate whore Adam Schiff and because Schiff was a big booster of the Monsanto Protection Act, Stokes tried to make GMO labeling a big issue. He raised a total of $6,893 for the campaign-- against Schiff's $819,788 (plus the $2,000,000-plus war chest Schiff is sitting on for the race for Boxer's Senate seat). Predictably, Schiff won-- but Stokes did surprising well-- 69,944 for Schiff to 22,083, almost a quarter of the voters). A lot more work needs to be done, apparently even in enlightened bastions like Silverlake, Los Feliz, Glendale, Hollywood, and West Hollywood. April McCarthy reported this week that scientists have officially linked processed foods to an increase in auto-immune diseases like multiple sclerosis, alopecia, asthma and eczema. Scientists from Yale in the U.S. and the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany have found that "excess refined and processed salt may be one of the environmental factors driving the increased incidence of autoimmune diseases." And, as McCarthy reminds us, "Junk foods at fast food restaurants as well as processed foods at grocery retailers represent the largest sources of sodium intake from refined salts."

The Canadian Medical Association Journal sent out an international team of researchers to compare the salt content of 2,124 items from fast food establishments such as Burger King, Domino’s Pizza, Kentucky Fried Chicken, McDonald’s, Pizza Hut and Subway. They found that the average salt content varied between companies and between the same products sold in different countries.

U.S. fast foods are often more than twice as salt-laden as those of other countries. While government-led public health campaigns and legislation efforts have reduced refined salt levels in many countries, the U.S. government has been reluctant to press the issue. That’s left fast-food companies free to go salt crazy, says Norm Campbell, M.D., one of the study authors and a blood-pressure specialist at the University of Calgary.

Many low-fat foods rely on salt-- and lots of it-- for their flavor. One packet of KFC’s Marzetti Light Italian Dressing might only have 15 calories and 0.5 grams fat, but it also has 510 mg sodium-- about 1.5 times as much as one Original Recipe chicken drumstick. (Feel like you’re having too much of a good thing? You probably are).

Bread is the No. 1 source of refined salt consumption in the American diet, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Just one 6-inch Roasted Garlic loaf from Subway-- just the bread, no meat, no cheeses, no nothing-- has 1,260 mg sodium, about as much as 14 strips of bacon.

The team from Yale University studied the role of T helper cells in the body. These activate and ‘help’ other cells to fight dangerous pathogens such as bacteria or viruses and battle infections.

Previous research suggests that a subset of these cells-- known as Th17 cells-- also play an important role in the development of autoimmune diseases.

In the latest study, scientists discovered that exposing these cells in a lab to a table salt solution made them act more “aggressively”. They found that mice fed a diet high in refined salts saw a dramatic increase in the number of Th17 cells in their nervous systems that promoted inflammation. They were also more likely to develop a severe form of a disease associated with multiple sclerosis in humans.

The scientists then conducted a closer examination of these effects at a molecular level. Laboratory tests revealed that salt exposure increased the levels of cytokines released by Th17 cells 10 times more than usual. Cytokines are proteins used to pass messages between cells.

Study co-author Ralf Linker, from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, said:

“These findings are an important contribution to the understanding of multiple sclerosis and may offer new targets for a better treatment of the disease, for which at present there is no cure.”

Multiple Sclerosis develops when the immune system mistakes the myelin that surrounds the nerve fibres in the brain and spinal cord for a foreign body. It strips the myelin off the nerves fibres, which disrupts messages passed between the brain and body causing problems with speech, vision and balance.

Another of the study’s authors, Professor David Hafler from Yale University, said that nature had clearly not intended for the immune system to attack its host body, so he expected that an external factor was playing a part. He said:

“These are not diseases of bad genes alone or diseases caused by the environment, but diseases of a bad interaction between genes and the environment.

“Humans were genetically selected for conditions in sub-Saharan Africa, where there was no salt. It’s one of the reasons that having a particular gene may make African Americans much more sensitive to salt.

“Today, Western diets all have high salt content and that has led to increase in hypertension and perhaps autoimmune disease as well.”

...Refined, processed and bleached salts are the problem. Salt is critical to our health and is the most readily available nonmetallic mineral in the world. Our bodies are not designed to processed refined sodium chloride since it has no nutritional value. However, when a salt is filled with dozens of minerals such as in rose-coloured crystals of Himalayan rock salt or the grey texture of Celtic salt, our bodies benefit tremendously for their incorporation into our diet.