Researchers report levels of a fungal toxin in organic and conventional apple juice.
Fungal Toxins in Apples
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Fact or fiction, though? Many of us were told as kids not to eat the brown parts. But can we eat the whole apple, bruises and all?
Patulin is a mycotoxin produced by a fungus that infects apples, and can cause those characteristic brown patches. If it is a human carcinogen—and we’re still not sure—it’s a pretty weak one. So the concern is not with the apples themselves—because we can just cut away the brown parts—but with apple juice, where companies can get away with using fallen, rotting, moldy apples—and we would never know, unless researchers started testing apple juice for the presence of fungal toxins.
And in countries around the world, patulin levels in apple juice—the #1 source of fruit servings for toddlers in this country—have in many cases exceeded the World Health Organization safety guidelines.
Always better to consume apples than apple juice. But if you are going to drink apple juice, choose organic, as none of the samples of organic juice in the latest 2009 study exceeded those safety limits.
To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by veganmontreal.
Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.
Fact or fiction, though? Many of us were told as kids not to eat the brown parts. But can we eat the whole apple, bruises and all?
Patulin is a mycotoxin produced by a fungus that infects apples, and can cause those characteristic brown patches. If it is a human carcinogen—and we’re still not sure—it’s a pretty weak one. So the concern is not with the apples themselves—because we can just cut away the brown parts—but with apple juice, where companies can get away with using fallen, rotting, moldy apples—and we would never know, unless researchers started testing apple juice for the presence of fungal toxins.
And in countries around the world, patulin levels in apple juice—the #1 source of fruit servings for toddlers in this country—have in many cases exceeded the World Health Organization safety guidelines.
Always better to consume apples than apple juice. But if you are going to drink apple juice, choose organic, as none of the samples of organic juice in the latest 2009 study exceeded those safety limits.
To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by veganmontreal.
Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.
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Title
Fungal Toxins in Apples
LicenseCreative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)
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