This Should Scare You— The Chemical Paradox

Every bite we take, every sip we swallow, commonly carries with it a cocktail of compounds most of us know nothing about. At first glance this seems indifferent, but it should scare you… a lot. But as always, we never point out a problem without some solutions, so without further ado, let's unveil how a chemical is determined to be safe and why this method of selecting chemicals is fundamentally flawed, making way for a catastrophic result.

I'm a Barbie Girl in a Chemical World

Ahh, chemicals. The legacy that the 21st century will leave rest of humanity. Roughly every 6 hours a brand new chemical is created and commercialized, equating to over 80,000 new compounds in the past 50 years. The best bit? It’s only speeding up. Lets look at some mortifying stats:

According to an article, “Fifty-three-point eight percent of food products contained at least 1 food additive and 11.3% at least 5”. Keep in mind that those statistics are from the french food market, so you can bet that America will generally be quite a bit worse.
This article states the average french adult gobbled up over 8.8 lbs of food additives a year. Again, this is France, where the notion of fruits and veggies have been partially preserved and not passed down as legend like the US.

How Chemical Safety Is Determined

Each country has an agency that is in charge of determining what can or cannot be added to our food, good right? In theory this should be a very rigorous processthat permits only the most benign and inert chemicals to be added to the food we eat. Repeat the mantra after us, “we are what we eat”. Clearly some Agencies *Cough* The FDA *Cough* haven’t gotten the memo yet.

Speaking of the FDA, when approving a chemical they establish an ADI (Acceptable Daily Limit). This is the amount safe to consume each day over the course of a person’s lifetime says the FDA, yet there has never been a trial that lasted a person's entire lifetime. This means that assumptions and extrapolations have to be made about a chemicals’ safety. Think of it as an educated guess that determines the safety of a chemical. If you’re cool with it, then they are too. The thing is most people aren’t, which is why this little fact is so unknown.

Let’s draw out the process of approving your very own chemical (the same process used in approving any other).

How to approve a chemical with the FDA (overly Simplified):

Congratulations, you’ve just discovered a new chemical! Is it highly toxic, or good enough for the masses? Well now starts the approval of your chemical. The next step is to do in vivo testing (randomized trials on animals), typically done with rats. They start dishing out different doses of our chemical to each rat proportional to their body weight. After a lot of trial and error you come up with NOAEL or No-Adverse Effect Level. In plain english this is the maximum amount of a chemical that a rat can ingest per pound without showing any deterioration in its health. And no, we won’t get into how horrible this method of testing is.
Now you create a substance submission to the FDA for them to review. If your testing was accurate the FDA will approve it and create an Acceptable Daily Intake. They are now tasked with running your numbers through a highly complex formula. The formula looks something like this: divide the amount that was inert to the rat per pound, and divide that by a hundred. So if 20mg was safe then we can determine that for humans it will be at least 0.2mg/day. Tadaa, that’s the math on that one. Afterwards your chemical goes into clinical trials where a lucky few get to experience your chemical in all of its glory and side effects. Naturally, the trial can’t last a lifetime, so 6 years will do.
Add this new chemical wherever you see fit!

Editor's Note: At OmniBlue we are revolted by the addition of harmful chemicals into our food, water and air. For these reasons all of our products are 100% natural and free of harmful chemicals, fillers, flavors and sweeteners.

Why Individual Safety Doesn’t Mean It’s Safe

This question is the crux of what we call the Chemical Paradox. Why? It’s paradoxical because although it’s true that a chemical that is safe at 1% NOAEL you can be sure that it will be safe, the problem is that this doesn’t reflect the compounding effect that we experience by being exposed to so many chemicals and additives in our day to day.

We will use the term food additive as defined by the FDA, “any substance the intended use of which results or may reasonably be expected to result, directly or indirectly, in its becoming a component or otherwise affecting the characteristic of any food (including any substance intended for use in producing, manufacturing, packing, processing, preparing, treating, packaging, transporting, or holding food; and including any source of radiation intended for any such use)”. That way we are clear about what we mean when we refer to food additives as opposed to chemicals in general and other types of contaminants that we can find in our food, water and environment.

Back to the paradox. A single food additive may be safe, we won't refute that. Now how about 10,000? The NIH says there are over 10,000 food additives present in our food, making it one heck of a challenge for the FDA to assess the danger of each one. The truth is, you probably aren’t so sure there, and neither are we. That is the enormous flaw in this equation. It is incredibly difficult, and realistically impossible, to create a study that evaluates the compounding effect of all 10,000 over the course of an entire lifetime, so the detrimental effects are unknown.

Unknown Effects

Picture this, you accidentally leave chicken out just a tad too long and don’t cook it properly. You eat it and get salmonella the next day. You can safely assume that the chicken caused it. This is called an acute intoxication. But what happens if the detrimental effects are not materialized until 40 years after? Maybe the effects are not manifested in you but in your children. We don’t mean to be too cryptic but this is what we feel is the side of the story that is not told to the public, and we feel that this is something that we all have a right to be aware of.

What are the effects that may be associated with our new appetite for food additives? As this study puts it, “health issues such as asthma, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), heart difficulties, cancer, obesity, and others are caused by harmful additives and preservatives. Some food additives may interfere with hormones and influence growth and development.” Now for the scary coincidence. These are all conditions that have been on a rampaging upswing in our society. Check these numbers out:

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder or ADHD has risen from a 6.1% prevalence in 1997 to 10.2% in 2016, says NIH.
Obesity has doubled worldwide since 1990, says WHO.
Cancer rates increased nationwide over 36% from 2000 to 2021, says USAfacts.

*IMPORTANT: Before you dive headfirst into panic mode and start planning your apocalypse bunker, let’s clear up a few things.

First off, the rise in certain diseases doesn’t mean we’re all doomed. We’re spotting more cases because we’ve got better ways to detect them—not necessarily because there are more cases. It’s like finding more dirt in your house because you bought a vacuum with a laser pointer.

Secondly, determining the etiology (or cause) of the rise in prevalence is incredibly complicated to say the least. Science is working hard, but it’s still grappling with the million-piece puzzle of causation.

The moral of the story is that food additives alone are not the only bad guys responsible for some of the most common health issues, but they are certainly not helping. Sadly, you can never be fully safe from the detrimental effects of human activity. Take plastics. Plastic is like the uninvited guest at every party—it's in the air you breathe, the fish you eat, and in most everything. So, while we’re all juggling a mess of issues, remember: it’s a complex, multi-faceted scenario, not just a single culprit with a mustache twirling in the shadows.

What to do

Is the only solution to live the homestead life in the Appalachian mountains? Funny enough that’s probably not a bad idea, but many of us unfortunately can’t leave our urban dwellings. So here’s a few pointers:

Eat a minimally processed diet. Ultra processed foods are where we get the most food additives in our diet, so by switching to healthier options you will greatly reduce your daily consumption. By having veggies, fruits, meats and unrefined grains make up the bulk of your diet you will be 90% of the way there.
Make sure to wash your fruits and veggies!!! They are transported in dirty trucks, touched by many hands, and unfortunately many are sprayed with harmful chemicals (yes, even organic foods). So give them a thorough wash before cooking or consumption.
Read food labels: In the land of unhealthy food (sorry America) reading food labels is the best line of defense against hidden food additives. Skip the health marketing on the front of the product and go straight to the label. Companies can lie about a lot of things but not the ingredients, so it's a sure way to weed out the wolves in sheep's clothing. We recommend applying the rule of 5, generally speaking if a food has less than 5 ingredients it will tend to be less processed and healthier. Give it a try next time you go shopping and let us know what you find out!

Final thoughts

In the end, navigating the chemical jungle of our modern diet might feel like trying to dodge raindrops in a hurricane, but hey, let’s not get too down about it! Opt for fresh fruit over a neon-colored snack and scrutinize that ingredient list, your health may depend on it!

Needless to say, most of us aren’t getting the minerals we need, but you can, in one teaspoon of natural goodness. OmniBlue contains all the essential minerals, is 100% natural and has one ingredient- concentrated ocean water. Not to mention our strict no-junk policy.

Enjoy your Monday and we’ll see you next week!