Toxic tuna alarm treated with nitrites and nitrates
Nine of them end up in the emergency room after consuming tuna in two different Florentine restaurants, another case in a restaurant in Portoferraio, in the Brindisi area an entire family was sick with respiratory problems. Symptoms are those of food poisoning: nausea, vomiting, unconsciousness and fainting. The cause: tuna treated with nitrates.
This was said by Adriano Rotunno, director of the food hygiene service of the Brindisi ASL: “The alert came from Tuscany. In fact, a batch of tuna arrived from Spain was identified and treated and packaged in Puglia, in the Bat. Apparently Lhe raw material was not the best of authenticity and a nitrate-based preservative was used to stabilize the color. Injections of preservatives maybe they contained a quantity greater than that allowed. For this then the problems of asphyxiation and breathing difficulties “.
“Unfortunately we only recovered part of the goods” warns Rotundo “Anyone who bought fresh tuna these days should be careful: it cannot be excluded that it is the same game “.
Ma nitrites and nitrates they are not only used in fish: they are used as preservatives, however add flavor and color also to processed meats, ie cured meats and sausages. Let’s think of cooked ham, typically associated with a simple and genuine diet, so much so that it is often found on the menus of kindergartens or hospital patients: without nitrites and nitrates it would be gray. Not that reassuring pink color, but gray.
Carcinogenic nitrites and nitrates, France bans them
Yet, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a body of the World Health Organization, has classified ingested nitrates and nitrites as likely carcinogens for humans (Group 2A). So do they increase the risk of cancer? “It depends” is written on the site dell’Airc “Most additives are harmless, but some can undergo changes in the body or during cooking which transform them into potentially dangerous substances. “In other words, nitrites and nitrates in contact with an acidic environment such as our stomach can become toxic, if not carcinogenic.
This is why France is moving to ban them. “Ham is a health hazard. We know now. The nitrite salts in cured meats kill the French. If this proposal does not pass then I wonder what we are doing here, “Richard Ramos, a former restaurant critic who is now a deputy for the Democratic Movement, told the French parliament, presenting the bill last December. , would be the first placed in Europe, and would apply from 2023.
Who Poisoned Your Bacon Sandwich? Guillaume Coudray’s book
It also comes from France a powerful book, who with great anger and effectiveness tackles the theme, written by documentary filmmaker Guillaume Coudray which for ten years has examined and investigated the use of nitrites and nitrates in meat processing. Who poisoned your bacon?, for now available in Italy only in English, it tells the whole story of how, since the seventies, the meat processing industry has denied the health risks because these additives make curing cheaper and faster, extending the shelf life and giving the meat a pleasant pink color.
“Did you know that bacon, ham, hot dogs and salami are classified by the World Health Organization as ‘category 1 carcinogens‘? You would eat them if you knew that cause bowel cancer due to nitrites and nitrates? “asks Guillaume very directly.” These additives are useless. Parma ham does not contain them for almost 30 years, and in fact all traditional cured meats were once produced without nitrates and nitrites “. Over time, the industry subject to the market, slave to the growth of production at all costs” has made consumers believe that these expedients are inevitable, that cancer is a necessary risk to avoid other problems. It is not so. European artisans and peasants are perhaps the first victims the maneuvers of the industrial processed meat lobby and the great interests it represents “.
But in conclusion, Guillaume offers a glimmer of hope: in the age of social media it will become increasingly difficult to hide the fact that “the nitro-treatments make the meat carcinogenic with no useful purpose “, and it will be more and more expensive to maintain “the lies on which the nitrate lobby is founded “. In the end, in fact, the decision is in the hands of the public, of the final consumer, who can choose whether or not to purchase products treated with nitrates and nitrites: it is precisely to consumers that Guillaume’s book is addressed, to “make them aware that what done so far has caused damage and deaths, but the future can still be changed “.