Category Archives: Food safety

Dietary supplements causing severe liver injuries in Australians, with some requiring transplants, study shows

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Researchers say cases linked to products claiming to promote muscle growth or weight loss are rising and more rigorous oversight is needed

The number of patients being admitted to hospital with severe liver injuries caused by herbal and dietary supplements claiming to promote muscle growth or weight loss is increasing, with some people harmed so severely they required a liver transplant.

A study led by Dr Emily Nash from the Royal Prince Alfred hospital examined hospital records of 184 adults admitted to the AW Morrow Gastroenterology and Liver Centre with drug-induced liver injury between 2009 and 2020. She and her co-authors found liver injury cases linked to herbal and dietary supplements increased from two out of 11 patients (15%) during 2009–11, to 10 out of 19 patients (47%) during 2018–20.

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UK-US Brexit trade deal ‘could fill supermarkets with cancer-risk bacon’

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Fears of illness over nitrites used in US but currently banned in Britain and EU

British stores could be flooded with “dangerous” bacon and ham from the US, marketed under misleading labels, as the result of a transatlantic trade deal, says the author of a new book based on a decade of investigation into the food industry.

The meat has been cured with nitrites extracted from vegetables, a practice not permitted by the European Commission because of evidence that it increases the risk of bowel cancer. But it is allowed in the US, where the product is often labelled as “all natural”. The powerful US meat industry is likely to insist that the export of nitrite-cured meat is a condition of a post-Brexit UK-US trade deal, which the UK government is under intense pressure to deliver.

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Yellow mealworm safe for humans to eat, says EU food safety agency

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Move paves way for high-protein maggot-like insect to be approved for consumption across Europe

Yellow mealworm finger foods, smoothies, biscuits, pasta and burgers could soon be mass produced across Europe after the insect became the first to be found safe for human consumption by the EU food safety agency.

The delicacies may not be advisable for everyone, however. Those with prawn and dustmite allergies are likely to suffer a reaction to the Tenebrio molitor larvae, whether eaten in powder form as part of a recipe or as a crunchy snack, perhaps dipped in chocolate.

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Fists and pig guts fly in Taiwan’s parliament debate on US pork imports – video

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Legislators from Taiwan's main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party threw pig guts and exchanged punches with other lawmakers in parliament on Friday as they tried to stop the premier, Su Tseng-chang, from taking questions, in a bitter dispute over easing US pork imports. 

President Tsai Ing-wen announced in August that the government would, from 1 January, allow imports of US pork containing ractopamine, an additive that enhances leanness but is banned in the EU and China, as well as US beef more than 30 months old

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UK will not import chlorinated chicken from US, ministers say

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Britain will also ‘not negotiate to remove ban’ on hormone-fed beef in post-Brexit trade deal

The government has finally vowed not to allow chlorinated chicken or hormone-fed beef on British supermarket shelves, defying demands from the US that animal welfare standards be lowered as part of a future trade deal.

The international trade secretary, Liz Truss, and the environment minister, George Eustice, have also revealed the government will be putting the recently established trade and agriculture commission on a statutory footing with a new amendment to the agriculture bill.

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Pandemic has exposed Britain’s vulnerabilities says food policy review

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Henry Dimbleby’s national food strategy starts with review of ‘slow-motion disaster’ diet, poverty, and post-Brexit laws

It is a year since Michael Gove asked the businessman Henry Dimbleby to produce a national food strategy. In that time the coronavirus pandemic has brutally exposed the cracks in the British food system so the launch of part one of his review this Wednesday comes in a new and urgent context.

After only a few weeks of lockdown three million people in Britain were in households where someone was forced to skip meals and go hungry.

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Worm found in tonsil of Japanese woman with sore throat

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Near-4cm-long nematode roundworm is thought to have come from raw fish

An unpleasant sensation at the back of the throat can be a sign that a cold is on the way. But for one Tokyo woman, the cause of the pain was not a sniffle but a live worm that had lodged itself inside one of her tonsils.

Doctors at St Luke’s International hospital in the Japanese capital removed the long black worm with tweezers after the patient had complained of throat pain and irritation, according to a case study published in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

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‘We always get an A’: Fukushima strives to prove food safety before Tokyo Games

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Stringent testing continues in prefecture to counter reputational damage from triple disaster

Knives are wielded in silence as chunks of meat are sliced up and placed in containers, the reputation of an entire region resting on every step of the process being completed without a hitch.

Staff at the Fukushima Agricultural Technology Centre are dissecting samples of beef neck; on other days it could be batches of cucumbers and peaches, or fish from the nearby Pacific Ocean.

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Barnier pours scorn on Johnson’s spokesman ahead of trade talks

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EU negotiator signals future relationship negotiations are on course for acrimonious start

Negotiations over Britain’s future relationship with the EU appear on course for an acrimonious start after Michel Barnier poured scorn on Boris Johnson’s spokesman and suggested the new Northern Ireland secretary did not understand the withdrawal agreement.

Barnier said he expected the talks, starting on Monday, to be “very difficult” but pronounced Brussels as “ready” following the official sign-off by EU ministers of their instructions for their chief negotiator.

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Hummus firm in salmonella scare was fined for egg contamination

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Zorba fined £93,000 in Wales for supplying egg-free branded tzatziki dip containing egg

The food company at the centre of a hummus salmonella scare received a substantial fine less than a month ago for food standard offences involving another dip, it has emerged.

Zorba Delicacies, which has been forced to extend a recall of 80 types of hummus products supplied to various supermarkets, was found to have supplied an egg-free branded tzatziki dip which contained egg protein.

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Block on GM rice ‘has cost millions of lives and led to child blindness’

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Eco groups and global treaty blamed for delay in supply of vitamin-A enriched Golden Rice

Stifling international regulations have been blamed for delaying the approval of a food that could have helped save millions of lives this century. The claim is made in a new investigation of the controversy surrounding the development of Golden Rice by a team of international scientists.

Golden Rice is a form of normal white rice that has been genetically modified to provide vitamin A to counter blindness and other diseases in children in the developing world. It was developed two decades ago but is still struggling to gain approval in most nations.

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Hancock pledges hospital food overhaul after listeria deaths

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Factory production of sandwiches linked to five cases is halted as health secretary demands action

Health secretary Matt Hancock has ordered a “root and branch” review of NHS food after two more patient deaths were linked last week to a listeria outbreak. The new deaths bring the number of suspected fatalities to five and doctors have warned that further cases could occur.

Hancock said he was “incredibly concerned” after it emerged the patients were suspected of dying as a result of eating pre-packaged sandwiches and salads linked by the same supplier, The Good Food Chain.

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Revealed: no need to add cancer-risk nitrites to ham

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Confidential meat industry report shows additives do not prevent food poisoning

A bombshell internal report written for the British meat industry reveals nitrites do not protect against botulism – the chief reason ham and bacon manufacturers say they use the chemicals.

The study, conducted for the British Meat Processors Association (BMPA) by the scientific consultancy Campden, and marked “confidential”, examines the growth of the toxin Clostridium botulinum in the processing of bacon and ham.

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US ambassador to UK under fire over defence of chlorinated chicken

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Critics say process Woody Johnson called ‘no-brainer’ is ‘harmful’ to nation’s health

The US ambassador to Britain, Woody Johnson, has come under fire from a leading food critic, a farming union and trade justice campaigners over his push to open up the UK to American farmers post-Brexit.

Jay Rayner, the BBC presenter, Observer columnist and MasterChef critic, said the UK should tell Johnson where he can stick chlorinated chicken, the US’s preferred approach for protecting consumers from pathogens such as salmonella and campylobacter.

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Woman dies after eating at Michelin-starred restaurant

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Spanish authorities say 28 others suffered food poisoning after dining at Riff in Valencia

One woman has died and 28 people have suffered food poisoning after eating at a Michelin-starred restaurant in the eastern Spanish city of Valencia.

The 46-year-old woman, who has not been named, became ill after having a meal at the Riff restaurant with her husband and son. She died in the early hours of Sunday. Her husband and son are recovering.

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