March 15 2011
http://blogs.mercola.com/sites/vitalvotes/archive/2011/03/15/foods-with-scary-surprises.aspx
The FDA has established guidelines for a number of contaminants that it will allow in our food supply. Mainstreet.com has assembled a list of some of the most common products for which the FDA has set contamination thresholds. Here’s just a taste of what they found:
Potato Chips
The FDA only takes action when 6 percent or more of chips show rot from pre- or post-harvest infection.
Tomatoes
Acceptable levels of mold contamination go as low as 15 percent in canned tomatoes to as high as 45 percent for ketchup. And the FDA allows up to 30 fly eggs per every 100 grams of tomato sauces, or up to two maggots per every 100 grams of tomato juice.
Raisins
The FDA won’t mandate action unless 10 or more whole or equivalent Drosophila flies and 35 of its eggs are found per 8 ounces of raisins.
Macaroni
To take action, the FDA must find either an average of 225 insect fragments per 225 grams in six subsamples, or an average of 4.5 rodent hairs per 225 grams in six subsamples.
March 16, 2011