Campaign against ready made food, Stop ready meals and foodborne diseases |
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Welcome
1. NEWS - 2. WHY STOP READY MEALS? - 3. FOOD PATHOGENS AND FOODBORNE DISEASES - 4. THE DAWN OF FOOD CORPORATISM-WHO CONTROLS WHAT WE EAT AND DRINK?
TO VISIT THE BACTERIA CLINIC CLICK HERE
BBC radio and TV (programme: “Farming Today”) did recently a programme regarding “Ready Meals”. While the series was already broadcasted on the radio, the journalist phoned me – calling me an expert in Ready Meals (he was aware about our website www.stop-readymeals.com) – and did ask me to be interviewed.
He never called back! When I rang him, he said that no more information is required.
I then spoke to a BBC journalist in TV for an hour regarding Ready Meals, because they were “planning a story as well”. After a one hour chat with lots of explanation I never heard back from them.
Now… what is the problem?
Very simple: Regarding “Dangers of Ready Meals”… it is NOT about freshness of ingredients, levels of salty or fat. It is about the shelf life, about bacteria in Ready Meals and about Histamines!
They never mentioned anything like that, but just did the usual superficial bladibla.
Notes on a level 1 (good) to 6 (very bad):
Research 6
Information 6
Ignorance 1
Being polite 6
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Our STOP-READY MEALS campaign was ignored for more than three years by the media. Of course one cannot blame the representatives of the media, because they are probably the biggest consumers of Ready Meals. All newspapers including GUARDIAN, TIMES, INDEPENDENT, DAILY TELEGRAPH, DAILY MAIL, etc. received our regular press infos, but only once did the DAILY MAIL express an interest, but backed off, once they experienced the power of the food multis and supermarkets.
UNTIL NOW...
Dirk Budka's "Ready Meal Research" on Channel 5, Monday 18th August at 12.30, 17.00 and 19.00h
Dirk Budka and his associates analysed for Channel 5 six different "Ready Meals" from four major UK supermarkets. Some might find the outcome shocking - we believe it is not unexpected: high levels of Bacteria and very high levels of Histamines. Details and comments regarding ready meals and this specific studies will be published soon and will be available on this website.
Here is a little extract:
The level for histamines in fish (there is NO rule/law for the amount of histamines in meat and other foods) is 200mg/kg. This a shocking level, because good quality fish contain less than 10 mg/kg histamine, a level of 30 mg/kg indicates already significant deteriation. We found levels of 185mg/kg and 450(!)mg/kg. How long will authorities and the Food Standard Agency (FSA) tolerate these limits? The incidents of reactions are on the increase, because approx. 5-10 % of the population suffer from histamine intolerance.
stop ready meals #02
CHANNEL 5, 18-08-2008: THE TRUTH ABOUT READY MEALS
We eat millions of them every year but today a Five News investigation into ready meals has found that many contain bacteria which could make you ill.
We found they have ingredients linked to food poisoning, bowel pain, asthma and even anaphylactic shock.
Our reporter Catherine Jones has been researching the truth about our foods. Read her blog on just what she found as she put ready meals under the microscope.
"This weekend I fed my one year old daughter some mackerel. Within seconds of the first mouthful she was crying as her mouth and cheek suddenly erupted in a nasty rash. I guessed she was having an allergic reaction to histamines in the fish and I quickly gave her some anti-histamine syrup.
It was somewhat ironic I got to see this reaction to histamine first hand, because I'd just received the results of tests that Five News had commissioned on six ready meals. And the most worrying result that the analysis revealed was a supermarket-bought Fisherman's Pie that contained extremely high levels of histamines: easily enough to cause a reaction exactly like my daughter's, or potentially one even worse in someone more intolerant.
There's a danger of food poisoning from many foods, as my experience with the mackerel demonstrates. Nevertheless, our test results on ready meals made sobering reading. As well as the high levels of histamines, in a meatball and mash dish we found Listeria (the bug that can cause miscarriage in pregnant women), and both the rice dishes we tested contained a bacteria I'd never even heard of, called Bacillus Cereus.
Now, store these meals correctly in the fridge, re-heat them properly and eat them before the use-by date, and if you've got a normal immune system, the bugs should present no problem.
But how many of us do that? I have to confess I make most ready meals last for a dinner and a lunch the following day. (And it's often my children who get the leftovers). Not only that, once the stuff's languished in my fridge for a bit, I'll throw away the meat bit, but still recycle the rice, presuming that it won't "go off" like meat does.
How wrong I am. The rice bug, Bacillus Cereus, continues to multiply and produce spores even in the fridge, and the spores aren't destroyed by cooking. That's why you should never re-heat rice more than once and never store it at room temperature. (And remember a ready meal rice dish has already been cooked once at the factory, so you must eat it the first time you heat it at home and then throw out the rest.)
Similarly, Listeria is often found in raw meat but cooking kills it. So cook the meatballs thoroughly and you'd be safe, but if you cut corners and grab it out of the microwave as soon as it looks hot enough, you may not have destroyed all the bacteria.
I used to take those ready meal instructions with a pinch of salt, thinking the manufacturers were probably being over-cautious to cover themselves. But from now on, knowing what may be lurking in there that could make me ill, I'll be following those guidelines to the letter."
COMMENT: They said at the end of the programme: "If you store and reheat the ready meals properly, it should be ok" ... Very funny! Bacillus cereus, spore forming bacteria, will survive the reheating process. And histamines? Well, just imagine that the food is "off". Do you believe it will be less "off" when you reheat it?
to visit the BACTERIA CLINIC CLICK HERE
to visit NUTRITIONLONDON CLICK HERE
to visit IBSFORUM CLICK HERE
to visit the REGENERATIVE HEALTH CLINIC CLICK HERE
to visit MSML LABORATORIES CLICK HERE
to visit the LASER CLINIC LONDON CLICK HERE
to visit the PARASITE CLINIC CLICK HERE
To listen To Dirk's Podcast with Merliannews.com in the USA CLICK HERE
NEWS
After being 'served' with the news, that many newly build hospitals do not have a kitchen any more and will be supplied with READY MEALS, now the "SCANDAL OF FILTHY HOSPITAL KITCHENS" is being published (OBSERVER, Sunday the 12th of August).
Patients in British hospitals are now presented with many choices: unhealthy food from filthy hospital kitchens OR unhealthy Ready Meals. Another choice:
to catch MRSA OR the superbug Clostridium difficile. There must be great material for a new Endemol-TV-Show out there...
+++THE TIMES in their "Body And Soul" supplement on Saturday, 02 June 2007:
"FOOD FOR FEAR...
Prepare for the next food scare: antibiotic-resistant ready-meals..."
This news is as old as ready meals themselves, nothing is new regarding antibiotic resistant bacteria or heat/cold resistant bacteria especially in ready meals.
+++THE TIMES, March 17 2007
"Timebomb Of Listeria In Poisoned Sandwiches"
by Valerie Elliott and David Rose
Front page news (although other papers did not report) for something which happens all the time! This time it came out...that's the difference. Every microbiology student in the first year nows that Listeria monocytogenes is a bacteria that never dies. And ready meals are generally bacterial time bombs, because of bacterial activities and bacterial products.
What's better than serving more ready meals in hospitals, where we find a high number of immuno-compromised patients? A new approach to save the NHS? And then there is the Fool's Standard Agency (sorry, means Food)... but this is a complete different story...
It is still interesting why journalists ignore the actions and campaigns against ready meals... One reason is obvious: looking at their hectic life(style), they are probably the best customers for fast-food/ready-meal outlets.
INTRODUCTION
NEWS 15/12/2006: "Hundreds of thousands of frozen ready meals are being withdrawn over fears they may contain pieces of glass. Asda, Birds Eye and Sainsbury are recalling products" (See newspapers)
A new aspect, the stop-readymeals-campaign has to take into account. Not only are ready meals unhealthy... now the adventure is added: recently we heard of glass in ready meals, moth larvae/cocoons, white hard plastic, metal, etc. We keep you posted - in the meantime have a look at the SUMMER DINNER on the NEWS & FUN page.
WHY STOP READY MEALS?
Once upon a time READY MEALS were an alternative exception, a substitute for a ’real meal’- used rarely when in a hurry. READY MEALS were deemed unhealthy.
Then manufacturers discovered the profitability and the mighty supermarket chains discovered how easy it is to stock and to manage READY MEALS compared to fresh food.
Since then, the ready meal has undergone a change of image. It is not deemed unhealthy any more, but a healthy option, and it is just a question of time when fresh food has the image of being unhealthy. The latest campaigns of the food industry are focussing on telling the customer how healthy their products are rather than how convenient.
And although The Food Labelling Regulations 1996 make it an offence to make medical claims on food – these are claims that a product has the ability to treat, prevent or cure a human disease or any reference to such a property – many products are marketed as “lowering cholesterol”, “helps your heart”, “gives you good bacteria”. The MHRA - Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency - has some very strange rules why big companies like Unilever (FLORA SOFT) are allowed to make medical claims for their "healthy products"... and why suppliers of good food supplements not. One example: It is proven that Vitamin B3 (NIACIN)reduces cholesterol. But manufacturers/distributors of NIACIN are not not allowed to claim this fact... As said before ... margarines can.
Anyway... Enough is said about reducing salt and fats, enough about the use of fresh ingredients or even organic food, which is likely to be undergoing a major change within the next years towards the interest of those who produce and sell ready meals, enough about fighting obesity.
The STOP READY MEALS campaign will also focus on different aspects of health problems caused by ready meals.
The following research projects have been already started:
1. Microbial Activities And Our Immune System – the connection between rising incidents of food allergies/intolerances or gastrointestinal diseases and the change of our food, especially ready meals.
2. The Production Of Biogenic Amines By Gram Positive And Gram Negative Bacteria In Foodstuff.
3. H5N1 Birdflu – Is There A Gastrointestinal Portal For The Bird Flu Virus?
4. Ready Meals And Listeria Monocytogenes
FOOD PATHOGENS AND FOOD-BORNE DISEASES
Many food pathogens are far more resistant to long-standing food-processing and storage techniques than expected. This causes alarm within the food industry, regulatory authorities and with scientists.
Bacteria and their products like endotoxins, enterotoxins and biogenic amines may directly or indirectly cause chronic diseases in humans or function as environmental triggers of diseases. This complex interaction between the microbe or its product and the human immune system can lead to autoimmune reactions and tissue damage in organs.
Microbial activity might be one reason for the rapid increase in food allergies and food intolerances. The increase in gastrointestinal diseases and digestive disorders is also a result of the activity of the microbe or its products which may disrupt intestinal integrity followed by the entry of substances or disruption of nutrient transport, which may lead to nutritional and immunologic deficits. Scientists and medical practitioners still do not know the origin of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (Crohn’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis) and Irritable Bowel Syndrome or IBS-RS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome Related Symptoms). And there are more diseases which are still more or less not fully understand but are connected with the change of the food we eat: the Histamine Intolerance, Leaky Gut Syndrome, Candida, Dysbiosis and other digestive disorders.
There is a knowledge gap in relation to food-borne diseases… and this gap might be in the interest of the food manufacturing and distribution industry. Why? New regulations, hastily put together by local authorities, food regulatory authorities like the FSA (Food Standard Agency), or the EU, are often bureaucratic, or already out of date, because of the ability of microbes to adapt rapidly to new environments.
The mighty food industry will always fight new health and safety regulations, because new regulations mean loss of profits. Food production and distribution practices have to keep pace with consumer demand and international competition.
The highest profitability is in READY MEALS.
Consumers are buying ready meals, which are offered to us under many different names: home meal replacement, convenience food, ready meals, ready-to-eat meals, sous-vide meals, pre-packed sandwiches/wraps/salads, ready-to-reheat meals, added-value food products… you name it.
Britain’s desire for convenience food is far ahead of the rest of Europe. (80% of the British population own a microwave oven compared to 27% of Italians). Ready meals represent the ultimate convenience food and require no preparation, which seems to be important when looking at our working and family patterns.
But: new pathogens are emerging and long-known microbes are expanding their reach. There is intensified food production, more food-miles and of course use of antimicrobials and hormones as growth promoters.
Resilient bacteria insinuate themselves into fruit, vegetables, poultry, beef and dairy products as they circulate around the globe, generating TRADE-RELATED INFECTIONS (Jill R. Hodges in ‘Globalization and Health’).
Many pathogens survive or even multiply… or they produce high levels of biogenic amines and/or toxins and spread to humans. Of course food safety measures are trying to address infectious pathways, but all of a sudden the microbes appear somewhere else…even in places where they have never been detected before.
THE DAWN OF FOOD CORPORATISM... and who controls what we eat and drink?
This is the dawn of Food Corporatism: The power of the food industry (we have to include the pharmaceutical industry when talking about preservation, food modification, colouring, gene-manipulation) is enormous.
There is a combined interest in selling products nobody needs but many want.
The industry is extremely successful in marketing their products and new trends. In the UK the ready meal has undergone a change of image. It is not deemed as unhealthy any more, it is not even an acceptable alternative but more and more a healthy option.
Yes! Ready meals are healthy! So they say… And the aggressive campaigns to promote ready meals as healthy options will lead rather sooner than later to an accepted opinion “Fresh food is unhealthy”.
Beside the main shopping factors (“I have not much time to shop and to prepare food”) and (“It has to be cheap”), consumers decide with their eyes (“looks yummy!”) and their smell, once the food is ready to eat. There is not much interest in the production of the food and no interest in food technology.
Technologies used include: MicVac overpressure, rapid microwave heating, Ohmic heating, Infrared drying, Halogen (IR) lamp- microwave combination oven for bread baking, non-thermal processing, pulsed electric field processing (PEF), E-beams (irridation), cold plasma, high intensity light, nanotechnology filtration, food-bioprocessing, membrane separation technology for saving energy and water, and many more. The customer trust that the food-companies’ main interest is the consumer’s well-being and not their profits…
Even the health practitioner ‘The Food Doctor”, has his own ranges of ready meals. He promotes it as follows:
“The range demonstrates that healthy food can be delicious and satisfying and provides a great alternative to the many high fat, high salt sandwiches available today.”
In this case, the consumer is told that a debate if ready meals are healthy or not, is not the point any more. In the past, healthy food had the stigma of not being tasty. And in this example the health debate is avoided by manipulating the consumer and telling him that the ‘obviously’ healthy food (of course healthy because it was created by nutritionists) even tastes good.
They are still within the pattern: “Change of ingredients makes us healthy again”. Now the industry uses less salt, less fats in general and less saturated fats and they try to avoid hydrogenated fats and use even organic ingredients. (By the way… nobody is prosecuting them for using the high amount of salt and fat in the first place.). But they are not focussing on the fact that convenience food is fighting our immune-system, which has not adapted to the new food, and might create new diseases. We have to bear in mind that some foods need many generations before our bodies adapt to it. Best example: Compare the incidents of soy allergies in the Western World to those in China or Japan. Magazines print articles written by “one-fits-all-nutritionists” who celebrate the advantage of soy without even mentioning the downsides.
We have less control over the food we eat and drink. We are putting our trust in safe food in the hand of others.
Who are the “others”?
At the bottom of the scale are the workers within the food-industry, often on a minimum wage, without the best understanding of food handling practices, trying to make a decent living.
At the top we have those who own manufacturing and/or distribution companies/outlets or are shareholders of those companies. In free-market terms it is their right to maximise profits and they are therefore interested in saving money wherever possible.
Somewhere in the middle we find small scale farmers and producers, in-house scientists with questionable independence, external scientists/researchers paid by the interested groups to deliver wanted results, herds of public relations people who influence the ‘independent’ media whose primary interest is not to inform but to be ahead of competitors.
And there is another group: the government, local authorities, governmental institutions, the EU, … and all those who have only the best interest of the consumers in their minds… of course.
Here we find all people and groups being lobbied by the industry.
Some examples of their ‘independence’:
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after Chernobyl there was no risk to eat all kinds of foods;
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during ‘foot and mouth’ outbreaks it was safe to eat pork;
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during BSE it was perfectly safe to eat beef and we even saw a politician who fed his daughter with a burger in front of running cameras;
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It is widely ignored that there might exist a gastro-intestinal portal for the H5N1 virus (Bird Flu)
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Food Standards Agency (FSA) chair Sir John Krebs said on the 4th of June 2003:
"In our view the current scientific evidence does not show that organic food is any safer or more nutritious than conventionally produced food”. Now… that’s something…
Here is one example of how a regulatory body reacts to “loss of nutrients in foods”
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The EU allows the fortification of food. Why? ”Added vitamins and minerals may replace some of the nutritional value lost when the food is being manufactured or stored. They can be added to substitute foods that resemble ordinary food. The best known example is margarine. (Yes, again "cholesterol-reducing FLORA") Vitamins A and D are added to margarine during production so it will have a similar vitamin level to butter. Nutrients may also be added to foods to fortify or enrich them even if the vitamins and minerals added are not normally contained in that food. Calcium is often added to fruit juices and this can provide an important source for people who do not eat dairy products.”
Fortification is fine – even without consulting the consumers – ... now they want to add Folic Acid to bread - but on the other hand the authorities regulate the food supplement industry more and more… because the pharmaceutical industry together with the food manufacturing giants like Danone, Unilever and Heinz are very successful lobbyists with more resources and possibilities to convince decision-makers.
We can go further and further…
Privatisation of hospitals (many new hospitals will have no kitchen and will be supplied with ready meals), schools, universities will spell the end of independent research. We will replace independent research with lobby research. Of course they will introduce much better names like target research or solution research. Means: The researcher is told what has to be the outcome of the research. But he can still decide the way towards the outcome :-)
So… the battle is lost!
Is it…?
STOP!
We can fight the trend… We will try to make the consumers aware of the risks of ready meals and microbial activity in convenience food.
The clear connection between “Microbial Activities And Our Immune system” and the “Production Of Biogenic Amines By Gram Positive and Gram Negative Bacteria In Foodstuff” is part of a report/research which will be published in 2007.
Extracts will be published over the next months on the other pages of this website.
Dirk Budka
LINKS
To visit Dirk Budka's websites NUTRITIONLONDON and IBS-FORUM just CLICK HERE(nutritionlondon) or CLICK HERE (IBS-forum) to go straight to it
for parasite clinic London CLICK HERE
for the Bacteria Clinic London CLICK HERE |
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