EU agencies and conflicts of interest

European Parliament reprimands food advisory body for industry links.
Three European agencies are fighting to rebut charges that they enjoy an overly cosy relationship with companies and interest groups.
Read article on the Nature science journal website

France rejected GMO report by EU food safety watchdog

Read AFP news report at google.com

Why does the EFSA defend the use of the sweetener, Aspartame?

Why does the European Food Safety Authority defend the use of the sweetener, aspartame, when long-term studies on developing rats by a prestigious European research institute have shown that aspartame causes cancer?

Read article on the website of the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) (UK)

I repeat: Why does the European Food Safety Authority defend the use of the sweetener, aspartame, when long-term studies on developing rats by a prestigious European research institute have shown that aspartame causes cancer?

What's in it for the EFSA?

EU Food Authority has double standards

According to an article in Nutraingredients.com, the European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) expressed a positive opinion regarding calcium fluoride as a source of fluoride in food supplements. That same day, another fluoride compound was approved - sodium monofluorophosphate - but this one was not mentioned in the Nutraingredients report. These opinions appear to be in stark contrast with the over-cautious evaluation of vital nutrients (vitamins and minerals) in progress. A scientific dossier proving the safety of those nutrient sources is required before EFSA will consent to their use in supplements, and limiting dosages are being considered to make sure there is not a shadow of a possibility of an 'adverse effect'.
Read post by Sepp Hasslberger at healthfreedomnet.ning.com

Fluoride: Now it can be added to our food! - I regard this as reprehensible.

Fluoride can now be added to foods manufactured and supplied in Europe. It’s been classified as a safe supplement, according to Europe’s highest authority on food standards. The decision means that food manufacturers can include sodium monofluorophosphate, the common form of fluoride found in toothpaste and mouth washes, to their products. The decision, by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), has angered the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH), the consumer pressure group, which is calling for an immediate enquiry.
Read article on the What Doctors Don't Tell You (WDDTY) website (UK)

UK children who eat more than a bar of chocolate a day could be at risk of falling ill if the snack was made using contaminated Chinese milk powder

China milk scandal: Children warned of risk from contaminated products
Article in the Telegraph

Extract:

"For the average six-year-old child eating more than 42grams of chocolate or more than 44grams of biscuits with creamy filling a day would exceed safe levels if the product was heavily contaminated, The European Food Safety Agency experts have calculated.

They stressed there is no evidence that highly contaminated biscuits and confectionary made from the contaminated milk has been imported into EU countries.

But based on a 'worst case scenario' small children who eat a lot of toffee, fudge, biscuits and milk chocolate daily could be at risk of consuming more than three times the safe limit of melamine, a report warned.

In China the contaminated milk scandal has seen 53,000 babies in ill and killing four.

The European Union has moved to ban imports of dairy-based Chinese food products, including biscuits, sweets and chocolate, aimed at children or infants amid the growing global health scare.

New "precautionary" restrictions imposed by the European Commission will come into force on Friday along with tighter EU border checks on all Chinese food products entering Europe."

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has ruled against the Food Commission's calls for a complete ban on food additives.

Food campaigners are up in arms following the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) ruling against Food Commission's calls for a complete ban on food additives. The call for a complete ban was made last week when the Food Commission identified Cadbury as having the most products that contain one or more of the seven food additives that contribute to increased hyperactivity in children. This includes products such as Cadbury Creme Egg, which is coloured with Sunset Yellow (E110), one of the additives that the Action on Additives says should be banned from children's food. The EFSA says that the UK study provides limited evidence that the additives "had a small and statistically significant effect on activity and attention in some children selected from the general population."
Read article in Marketing Week magazine (UK)
Comment: As is also the case with pesticides, many artificial additives are manufactured by some of the same pharmaceutical and chemical companies that would like to ban vitamin supplements and force GM foods onto our dinner plates.

A food additive (the colouring, E128) found in some sausages and burgers could trigger cancer, food safety specialists have warned.

Eating sausages 'could cause cancer' - Telegraph

Extract:

"A food additive found in some sausages and burgers could trigger cancer, food safety specialists have warned.

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) panel on food additives and flavourings yesterday recommended that the colouring E128 should no longer be considered safe for human consumption.

It released a statement describing E128, also known as Red 2G, as a "safety concern". The Food Standards Agency (FSA) will today hold a meeting with food manufacturers to establish how widely it is used in products sold in Britain. Many large brands have recently been trying to remove additives and artificial colourings from their meat products. For example, in May Asda pledged to remove artificial colours or flavours, hydrogenated fat or flavour enhancers from its 9,000 own label products by the end of this year.

However, E128 is still commonly used, especially in economy sausages and burgers."

You are possibly in more danger of developing cancer from the high sodium content of sausages if you are sensitive to salt/suffer from fluid retention - i.e. if you are overweight or obese or are taking certain powerful drugs on prescription. - See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html

and foods high and low in sodium

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk (The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free...(o:

Plans to allow genetically modified crops to be grown throughout Europe have been shelved.

Europe puts plans to grow GM crops on hold - Telegraph

Extract:

"Plans to allow genetically modified crops to be grown throughout Europe have been shelved amid fears of a public backlash against "Frankenstein foods".

The European Commission has failed to find enough support for its plans to lift a nine-year-old freeze on GM crops being grown on a commercial basis.

Officials were forced to drop plans to produce a penicillin-resistant GM potato after it became clear that a bloc of countries led by Austria, Greece and Luxembourg would vote against it.

Commission proposals to release the potato, developed by BASF for use in industrial starch, were withdrawn by the German EU presidency ahead of a meeting of Europe's environment ministers last week.

"It became clear that there was no way to get a majority for the first approval of a GM crop since 1998, so it has been taken off the agenda," said an official.

Many EU governments are strongly swayed by the campaign against GM foods which sprang up in the late 1990s. This is despite scientific advice, the approval of the European Food Safety Authority and the growing threat of a trade war with the US.

"Consumers, most of whom have no desire to eat GM produce, expect politicians to put their health, food safety and the environment before the vested interests of a few agro-chemical companies," said a Greenpeace spokesman yesterday."

Well that's a bit of good news...(o:


Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
How to Lose weight!

See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free...(o: