Cancer update -- Johns Hopkins -- Cancer News from Johns Hopkins :

1. 마이크로웨이브에 프라스틱용기를 사용하지 마라(No plastic containers in micro.)

2. 프라스틱물병을 냉동고에 얼리지 마라 (No water bottles in freezer.)

3. 프라스틱포장을 한체 마이크로웨이브를 사용하지 마라 (No plastic wrap in microwave.)

 

아침에 출근을 해서 이메일을 여니 Johns Hopkins 병원이 이메일 뉴스레터로 다음과 같은 중요한 내용을 알렸다는 내용을 어느직원이 돌렸습니다. 그직원의 부인이 유방암 수술을 받은지 얼마되지 않았는데 이 기사내용과 관련이 깊다는 군요. 시간나면 다이옥신이 뭔가도 알아보겟지만.

 

주위에 사랑하고 아끼는 가족과 친지 친구들에게 프라스틱용기나 렙을 마이크로웨이브에 사용하지 말고 프라스틱 물병을 얼리지도 말라고 알려야 겠지요.

 

영어공부하실겸 찬찬히 읽어 보세요.

 

1. No plastic containers in micro.

2. No water bottles in freezer.
3. No plastic wrap in microwave.

 

Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in its newsletters.  This information is being circulated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center as well.> Dioxin chemicals cause cancer, especially breast cancer. Dioxins are highly poisonous to the cells of our bodies.  Don't freeze your plastic bottles with water in them as this releases dioxins from the plastic.> Recently, Dr. Edward Fujimoto, Wellness Program Manager at Castle Hospital, was on a TV program to explain this health hazard. He talked about dioxins and how bad they are for us.>

 

He said that we should not be heating our food in the microwave using plastic containers. This especially applies to foods that contain fat. He said that the combination of fat, high heat, and plastics releases dioxin into the food and ultimately into the cells of the body. 
            
Instead, he recommends using glass, such as Corning Ware, Pyrex or ceramic containers for heating food.  You get the same results, only without the dioxin.  So such things as TV dinners, instant ramen and soups, etc., should be removed from the container and heated in something else.

 

Paper isn't bad but you don't know what is in the paper. It's just safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc.  

 

He reminded us that a while ago some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the foam containers to paper. The dioxin problem is one of the reasons.

 

Also, he pointed out that plastic wrap, such as Saran, is just as dangerous when placed over foods to be cooked in the microwave. As the food is nuked, the high heat causes poisonous toxins to actually melt out of the plastic wrap and drip into the food.

 

Cover food with a paper towel instead.

 

This is an article that should be sent to anyone important in your life!

 

 

Research has proved that microwaving foods in plastic containers releases cancer-causing agents into the foods.

 

Info for the Health Conscious

Dioxin Carcinogens causes cancer. Especially breast cancer. Don't freeze your plastic water bottles with water as this also releases dioxin in the Plastic.

On Channel 2 this morning. They had a Dr. Edward Fujimoto from Castle Hospital on the program. He is the manager of the Wellness Program at the hospital. He was talking about dioxins and how bad they are for us. He said that we should not be heating our food in the microwave using plastic containers. This applies to foods that contain fat. He said that the combination of fat, high heat and plastics releases dioxins into the food and ultimately into the cells of the body. Dioxins are carcinogens and highly toxic to the cells of our bodies. Instead, he recommends using glass, Corning Ware, or ceramic containers for heating food. You get the same results without the dioxins. So such things as TV dinners, instant saimin and soups, etc. should be removed from the container and heated in something else.

Paper isn't bad but you don't know what is in the paper. Just safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc. He said we might remember when some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the foam containers to paper. The dioxin problem is one of the reasons.

Pass this on to your family and friends.

 

1. In early 2004 the following paragraph was added to the beginning of the message quoted above:

Johns Hopkins Newsletter

Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in their newsletters. This information is being circulated At Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Dioxin Carcinogens cause cancer. Especially breast cancer. Don't freeze plastic water bottles with water in them as this also releases dioxin from the plastic. Dr. Edward from Castle hospital was on a TV program explaining this health hazard. He is the manager....

 

2. In November 2004, this message was combined with another piece about the purported dangers of lead-containing lipstick.

 

Origins:   This "health alert" began appearing in people's inboxes in February 2002; the "Channel 2" reference indicates it was someone's summarization of a short morning news health segment aired on KHON-TV in Hawaii on 23 January 2002, which was then forwarded all over the Internet as "important health information." one- or two-minute health spots on local news programs are not ideal sources of medical information, however. While important basic information can be imparted in such a format, trying to explicate complex medical topics in a minute or two can easily mislead or confuse viewers, many of whom come away believing absolutely whatever they've heard (or think they've heard) because "a doctor on TV said it was true" — in this case an unshakeable belief that using plastic containers in microwave ovens causes

cancer.

That a doctor (or, more accurately, someone bearing the title "Dr.") appears on TV does not mean he's a leading practitioner in his field; it generally means only that he has something to say that a news director considers newsworthy, accurate or not. (The "Dr. Edward Fujimoto" identified in this piece is not a staff physician from "Castle Hospital" or a medical doctor; he's a Ph.D. serving as director of the Center for Health Promotion at Castle Medical Center in Kailua, Hawaii.) What TV news covers is dictated by ratings, not importance, and sensational claims get better ratings than straightforward, mundane information, even if the latter is more valuable to the viewing audience. It's a pretty good assumption that if using plastic containers in microwaves — as millions of people have been doing for decades — posed a significant risk of cancer, you'd be hearing about it somewhere other than an e-mail forward of an anonymous summary of a morning news spot on a Hawaiian television station.

Is there really something to the central claim of this e-mail, that heating plastic in microwaves releases a cancer-causing agent into the food? It's within the realm of possibility that substances used during the manufacturing process of plastics could leak into food during the heating process, but research isn't conclusive about the potential for danger (if any) posed by such a phenomenon, and the FDA already imposes stringent regulations on plastic containers meant for microwaving as a preventive measure.

Dr. Rolf Halden of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health advises:

In general, whenever you heat something you increase the likelihood of pulling chemicals out. Chemicals can be released from plastic packaging materials like the kinds used in some microwave meals. If you are cooking with plastics or using plastic utensils, the best thing to do is to follow the directions and only use plastics that are specifically meant for cooking. Inert containers are best, for example heat-resistant glass, ceramics and good old stainless steel.

As for concerns about dioxins being released by freezing water in plastic bottles, Dr. Halden says:

This is an urban legend. There are no dioxins in plastics. In addition, freezing actually works against the release of chemicals. Chemicals do not diffuse as readily in cold temperatures, which would limit chemical release if there were dioxins in plastic, and we don't think there are.

Several months after this piece began to circulate, it was merged with a similar item describing a seventh-grade student's science project:

As a seventh grade student, Claire Nelson learned that di-ethyl-hexyl-adepate (DEHA), considered a carcinogen, is found in plastic wrap. She also learned that the FDA had never studied the effect of microwave cooking on plastic-wrapped food. Claire began to wonder: "Can cancer-causing particles seep into food covered with household plastic wrap while it is being microwaved?"

Three years later, with encouragement from her high school science teacher, Claire set out to test what the FDA had not. Although she had an idea for studying the effect of microwave radiation on plastic-wrapped food, she did not have the equipment. Eventually, Jon Wilkes at the National Center for Toxicological Research in Jefferson, Arkansas, agreed to help her. The research center, which is affiliated with the FDA, let her use its facilities to perform her experiments, which involved microwaving plastic wrap in virgin olive oil. Claire tested four different plastic wraps and "found not just the carcinogens but also xenoestrogen was migrating [into the oil]...." Xenoestrogens are linked to low sperm counts in men and to breast cancer in women.

Throughout her junior and senior years, Claire made a couple of trips each week to the research center, which was 25 miles from her home, to work on her experiment.

An article in Options reported that "her analysis found that DEHA was migrating into the oil at between 200 parts and 500 parts per million. The FDA standard is 0.05 parts per billion." Her summarized results have been published in science journals. Claire Nelson received the American Chemical Society's top science prize for students during her junior year and fourth place at the International Science and Engineering Fair (Fort Worth, Texas) as a senior. "Carcinogens-At 10,000,000 Times FDA Limits" Options May 2000. Published by People Against Cancer, 515-972-4444.

To add to this: Saran wrap placed over foods as they are nuked, with the high heat, actually drips poisonous toxins into the food. Use a paper towel instead.

This gist of this latter addition is true in that a student named Claire Nelson did perform the experiment described for a school science fair project back in 1997 (she came up with the idea for the project while she was in seventh grade, but as noted, she didn't actually conduct the experiment until three years later) by working with an FDA-affiliated laboratory. Like the Fujimoto piece, however, the claims made in this version tend towards the alarmist: the results of the experiment described tended to indicate that diethylhexyl adipate (DEHA) and xenoestrogens could migrate from plastic wraps into microwaved food (specifically olive oil, the "food" used in the experiment), but only with some brands of plastic wrap (primarily ones not sold as "microwave-safe") and only when the plastic wrap was in direct contact with the food being heated; moreover, no research has yet demonstrated that DEHA poses a significant cancer risk to humans at the levels noted here (even though they exceed FDA standards) or that xenoestrogens are a direct cause of breast cancer in women or reduced sperm counts in men.

Additional information:

	Cooking Safely in the Microwave Oven   (USDA)
	Cooking with Plastics   (Johns Hopkins University)

 

Featured Expert

Rolf Halden, Ph.D.
Department of Environmental Health Sciences,  Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

July 14, 2005

The Internet has been flooded with email warnings to avoid freezing water in plastic bottles so as not to get exposed to carcinogenic dioxins. Rolf Halden, PhD, PE, assistant professor in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences and the Center for Water and Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health received his masters and doctoral degrees researching dioxin contamination in the environment. He sets the record straight on dioxins in the food supply and the risks associated with drinking water from plastic bottles and cooking with plastics.

 

What are dioxins?

 

Rolf Halden: Dioxins are organic environmental pollutants sometimes referred to as the most toxic compounds made by mankind. They are a group of chemicals, which include 75 different chlorinated molecules of dibenzo-p-dioxin and 135 chlorinated dibenzofurans. Some polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) also are referred to as dioxin-like compounds. Exposure to dioxins can cause chloracne, a severe form of skin disease, as well as reproductive and developmental effects, and more importantly, liver damage and cancer.

 

Where do dioxins come from?

 

RH: We always thought dioxins were man-made compounds produced inadvertently during the bleaching of pulp and manufacturing of pesticides like Agent Orange and other chlorinated aromatics. But dioxins in sediments from lakes and oceans predate these human activities. It is now generally accepted that a principal source of dioxins are various combustion processes, including natural events such as wild fires and even volcanic eruptions.

 

Today, the critical issue is the incineration of waste, particularly the incineration of hospital waste, which contains a great deal of polyvinyl chloride plastics and aromatic compounds that can serve as dioxin precursors. one study examined the burning of household trash in drums in the backyard. It turns out that these small burnings of debris can put out as much or more dioxins as a full-sized incinerator burning hundreds of tons of refuse per day.

 

The incinerators are equipped with state-of-the-art emission controls that limit dioxin formation and their release into the environment, but the backyard trash burning does not. You set it ablaze and chemistry takes over. What happens next is that the dioxins are sent into the atmosphere where they become attached to particles and fall back to earth. Then they bind to, or are taken up, by fish and other animals, where they get concentrated and stored in fat before eventually ending up on our lunch and dinner plates. People are exposed to them mostly from eating meat and fish rich in fat.

 

What do you make of these email warnings that claim dioxins can be released by freezing water in plastic bottles?

 

RH: No. This is an urban legend. There are no dioxins in plastics. In addition, freezing actually works against the release of chemicals. Chemicals do not diffuse as readily in cold temperatures, which would limit chemical release if there were dioxins in plastic, and we don’t think there are.

 

So it’s okay for people to drink out of plastic water bottles?

 

RH: First, people should be more concerned about the quality of the water they are drinking rather than the container it’s coming from. Many people do not feel comfortable drinking tap water, so they buy bottled water instead. The truth is that city water is much more highly regulated and monitored for quality. Bottled water is not. It can legally contain many things we would not tolerate in municipal drinking water.

 

Having said this, there is another group of chemicals, called phthalates that are sometimes added to plastics to make them flexible and less brittle. Phthalates are environmental contaminants that can exhibit hormone-like behavior by acting as endocrine disruptors in humans and animals. If you heat up plastics, you could increase the leaching of phthalates from the containers into water and food.

 

What about cooking with plastics?

 

RH: In general, whenever you heat something you increase the likelihood of pulling chemicals out. Chemicals can be released from plastic packaging materials like the kinds used in some microwave meals. Some drinking straws say on the label “not for hot beverages.” Most people think the warning is because someone might be burned. If you put that straw into a boiling cup of hot coffee, you basically have a hot water extraction going on, where the chemicals in the straw are being extracted into your nice cup of coffee. We use the same process in the lab to extract chemicals from materials we want to analyze.

 

If you are cooking with plastics or using plastic utensils, the best thing to do is to follow the directions and only use plastics that are specifically meant for cooking. Inert containers are best, for example heat-resistant glass, ceramics and good old stainless steel.

 

Is there anything else you want to add?

 

RH: Don’t be afraid of drinking water. It is very important to drink adequate amounts of water and, by the way that’s in addition to all the coffee, beer and other diuretics we love to consume. Unless you are drinking really bad water, you are more likely to suffer from the adverse effects of dehydration than from the minuscule amounts of chemical contaminants present in your water supply. Relatively speaking, the risk from exposure to microbial contaminants is much greater than that from chemicals.

 

And here’s one more uncomfortable fact. Each of us already carries a certain body burden of dioxins regardless of how and what we eat. If you look hard enough, you’ll find traces of dioxins in pretty much every place on earth. Paracelsus the famous medieval alchemist, used to put it straight and simple: it’s the dose that makes the poison.