Arsenic-containing drugs intentionally added to poultry feed to reduce the parasite burden and pinken the meat are apparently converted by cooking into carcinogenic inorganic arsenic compounds.
How Many Cancers Have Been Caused by Arsenic-Laced Chicken?
4.6/5 - (16 votes)
Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.
In 2013, Maryland became “the first state to ban” the feeding of an arsenic-containing drug to chickens, used to control all the parasites, and give their meat “an appealing pink color.” “In 2011 the [FDA] found that the livers of…chickens [fed this drug] had elevated levels of [inorganic arsenic], a known human carcinogen. In response, [the drug’s] manufacturer, Pfizer, voluntarily pulled the drug off the U.S. market, although it is still sold overseas,” including to places that continue to export chicken back to us. And, “a similar arsenic[-containing] drug [for use in poultry] is still available in the United States. But, at least, the ban kept Maryland farmers from using stockpiles of the drug.
How much arsenic gets into the actual meat, though, not just the internal organs? We didn’t know, until recently. Researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health coordinated the purchase of chicken breasts off grocery store shelves in ten cities across the country, and found “70% of samples of chicken meat” from poultry producers that didn’t prohibit arsenic drugs were contaminated with the cancer-causing form of arsenic, at levels that “exceeded [the safety] threshold[s]” originally set by the FDA—that is, before they relented, and admitted there’s really no safe level of this kind of arsenic.
See, when the drug was first approved, “scientists believed its organic arsenic base would be excreted unchanged.” And, organic arsenic is much less dangerous than inorganic arsenic. But, guess what appears to convert the drug into the carcinogenic form? Cooking. When chicken meat is cooked, levels of the arsenic-containing drug go down, and levels of carcinogenic arsenic go up, suggesting that the drug “may degrade into [the cancer-causing inorganic arsenic] species during cooking.”
How much cancer are we talking about? If you estimate that about three-quarters of Americans eat chickens, then the arsenic in that chicken has potentially been causing more than a hundred cases of cancer every year. They conclude that “eliminating the use of arsenic-[containing] drugs in [chicken and pig] production could reduce the burden of arsenic-related disease[s] in the U.S. population.”
That’s one of the ways arsenic gets into rice. When we feed arsenic to chickens, to pinken their flesh, the resulting arsenic-bearing poultry manure is then “introduced to the environment.” The soil, the water, and then the rice can then suck it up from contaminated soil, and “be transferred to human beings” that don’t even eat chicken. We’re talking massive environmental contamination from the poultry industry; nearly two million pounds of arsenic has been “poured into the environment [every year] by the [chicken] industry alone” in the United States.
And now, we’re even seeing arsenic in foods sweetened with organic brown rice syrup—so, there’s all these knock-on effects. It reminds me of the arsenic-in-apple-juice story. Although the U.S. made lead- and arsenic-based pesticides illegal years ago, they still persist in the soil, so “even organic [products] are not immune.”
Yes, there’s arsenic deposits naturally found in the Earth’s crust, and there’s other industrial contamination and pesticide use, but “arsenic[-containing] poultry drugs have been deliberately administered to animals intended for human consumption [for 70 years]. Consequently, exposures resulting from [the] use of these drugs are far more controllable than are exposures from environmental sources.”
And, the good news is that thanks to a lawsuit from the Center for Food Safety and other consumer groups, three out of the four arsenic-containing drugs fed to poultry have been officially pulled from the market.
Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.
- K E Nachman, P A Baron, G Raber, K A Francesconi, A Navas-Acien, D C Love. Roxarsone, inorganic arsenic, and other arsenic species in chicken: A U.S.-Based market basket sample. Environ Health Perspect. 2013 121(7):818 – 824.
- F Wang, Z Chen, L Zhang, Y Gao, Y Sun. Arsenic uptake and accumulation in rice (Oryza sativa L.) at different growth stages following soil incorporation of roxarsone and arsanilic acid. Plant Soil. 2006 285:359–367.
- D Wilson, C Hooper, X Shi. Arsenic and lead in juice: Apple, citrus, and apple-base. J Environ Health. 2012 75(5):14 - 20 - quiz – 44.
- B P Jackson, V F Taylor, M R Karagas, T Punshon, K L Cottingham. Arsenic, organic foods, and brown rice syrup. Environ Health Perspect. 2012 120(5):623 – 626.
- C W Schmidt. Maryland bans arsenical drug in chicken feed. Environ. Health Perspect. 2012 120(7):a269.
Images thanks to michelle@TNS via flickr
Below is an approximation of this video’s audio content. To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video.
In 2013, Maryland became “the first state to ban” the feeding of an arsenic-containing drug to chickens, used to control all the parasites, and give their meat “an appealing pink color.” “In 2011 the [FDA] found that the livers of…chickens [fed this drug] had elevated levels of [inorganic arsenic], a known human carcinogen. In response, [the drug’s] manufacturer, Pfizer, voluntarily pulled the drug off the U.S. market, although it is still sold overseas,” including to places that continue to export chicken back to us. And, “a similar arsenic[-containing] drug [for use in poultry] is still available in the United States. But, at least, the ban kept Maryland farmers from using stockpiles of the drug.
How much arsenic gets into the actual meat, though, not just the internal organs? We didn’t know, until recently. Researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health coordinated the purchase of chicken breasts off grocery store shelves in ten cities across the country, and found “70% of samples of chicken meat” from poultry producers that didn’t prohibit arsenic drugs were contaminated with the cancer-causing form of arsenic, at levels that “exceeded [the safety] threshold[s]” originally set by the FDA—that is, before they relented, and admitted there’s really no safe level of this kind of arsenic.
See, when the drug was first approved, “scientists believed its organic arsenic base would be excreted unchanged.” And, organic arsenic is much less dangerous than inorganic arsenic. But, guess what appears to convert the drug into the carcinogenic form? Cooking. When chicken meat is cooked, levels of the arsenic-containing drug go down, and levels of carcinogenic arsenic go up, suggesting that the drug “may degrade into [the cancer-causing inorganic arsenic] species during cooking.”
How much cancer are we talking about? If you estimate that about three-quarters of Americans eat chickens, then the arsenic in that chicken has potentially been causing more than a hundred cases of cancer every year. They conclude that “eliminating the use of arsenic-[containing] drugs in [chicken and pig] production could reduce the burden of arsenic-related disease[s] in the U.S. population.”
That’s one of the ways arsenic gets into rice. When we feed arsenic to chickens, to pinken their flesh, the resulting arsenic-bearing poultry manure is then “introduced to the environment.” The soil, the water, and then the rice can then suck it up from contaminated soil, and “be transferred to human beings” that don’t even eat chicken. We’re talking massive environmental contamination from the poultry industry; nearly two million pounds of arsenic has been “poured into the environment [every year] by the [chicken] industry alone” in the United States.
And now, we’re even seeing arsenic in foods sweetened with organic brown rice syrup—so, there’s all these knock-on effects. It reminds me of the arsenic-in-apple-juice story. Although the U.S. made lead- and arsenic-based pesticides illegal years ago, they still persist in the soil, so “even organic [products] are not immune.”
Yes, there’s arsenic deposits naturally found in the Earth’s crust, and there’s other industrial contamination and pesticide use, but “arsenic[-containing] poultry drugs have been deliberately administered to animals intended for human consumption [for 70 years]. Consequently, exposures resulting from [the] use of these drugs are far more controllable than are exposures from environmental sources.”
And, the good news is that thanks to a lawsuit from the Center for Food Safety and other consumer groups, three out of the four arsenic-containing drugs fed to poultry have been officially pulled from the market.
Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.
- K E Nachman, P A Baron, G Raber, K A Francesconi, A Navas-Acien, D C Love. Roxarsone, inorganic arsenic, and other arsenic species in chicken: A U.S.-Based market basket sample. Environ Health Perspect. 2013 121(7):818 – 824.
- F Wang, Z Chen, L Zhang, Y Gao, Y Sun. Arsenic uptake and accumulation in rice (Oryza sativa L.) at different growth stages following soil incorporation of roxarsone and arsanilic acid. Plant Soil. 2006 285:359–367.
- D Wilson, C Hooper, X Shi. Arsenic and lead in juice: Apple, citrus, and apple-base. J Environ Health. 2012 75(5):14 - 20 - quiz – 44.
- B P Jackson, V F Taylor, M R Karagas, T Punshon, K L Cottingham. Arsenic, organic foods, and brown rice syrup. Environ Health Perspect. 2012 120(5):623 – 626.
- C W Schmidt. Maryland bans arsenical drug in chicken feed. Environ. Health Perspect. 2012 120(7):a269.
Images thanks to michelle@TNS via flickr
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Title
How Many Cancers Have Been Caused by Arsenic-Laced Chicken?
LicenseCreative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)
Content URLDoctor's Note
The antibiotics the poultry industry continues to feed chickens present another public health hazard. See my videos:
- Past the Age of Miracles: Facing a Post-Antibiotic Age
- Chicken Dioxins, Viruses, or Antibiotics?
- Superbugs in Conventional vs. Organic Chicken
- Lowering Dietary Antibiotic Intake
- Meat Mythcrushers
Cooking may also create other carcinogens from the muscle itself:
- Estrogenic Cooked-Meat Carcinogens
- PhIP: The Three Strikes Breast Carcinogen
- Reducing Cancer Risk In Meat-Eaters
Update: In 2017 I did a deep-dive into the arsenic issue. Here are the 13 videos in that series:
- Where Does the Arsenic in Chicken Come From?
- Where Does the Arsenic in Rice, Mushrooms, & Wine Come From?
- The Effects of Too Much Arsenic in the Diet
- Cancer Risk from Arsenic in Rice & Seaweed
- Which Rice Has Less Arsenic: Black, Brown, Red, White, or Wild?
- Which Brands & Sources of Rice Have the Least Arsenic?
- How to Cook Rice to Lower Arsenic Levels
- Arsenic in Infant Rice Cereal
- Arsenic in Rice Milk, Rice Krispies, & Brown Rice Syrup
- How Risky is the Arsenic in Rice?
- How Much Arsenic in Rice is Too Much?
- Is White Rice a Yellow-Light or Red-Light Food?
- Do the Pros of Brown Rice Outweigh the Cons of Arsenic?
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