Scientific Data Shows Mercury Contaminated High Fructose Corn Syrup Found in Coca Cola Classic, Hunts Ketchup, Smucker's Strawberry Jelly and more!

by Shane Shirley-Smith

There were two studies released last week showing varying levels of mercury contamination in High Fructose Corn Syrup. Obviously this is a horrible toxin which according to the FDA includes memory loss, mood swings, mental disturbance, skin rashes, impairment of the peripheral vision, disturbances in sensation, lack of coordination of movements such as writing and impairment of speech, hearing and walking in their list of symptoms from mercury poisoning.

HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) has only been widely used in foods since the 70's and only began being used in soda since the early 80's. Now it is considered one of U.S. Food manufacturer's major sweeteners.

According to the USDA, "1 in 10 calories the average American eats, now comes from HFCS". It is cheap and sadly the manufacturers have done a great job of figuring out how to use it in as many food products as possible. A sampling of products in which mercury was found include, but are not limited to: Hunts Ketchup, Hershey's Chocolate Syrup, Smucker's Strawberry jelly, Nutrigrain Cereal Bars, Quaker Oatmeal To Go and Coca Cola Classic.

Even I was fooled into believing this "mercury contamination story" simply could not be true; it just had to be another conspiracy theory by some misguided, wacko activists. A press release last week by Audra Erickson with the Corn Refiners Association, said that the study (released Monday) was based on outdated manufacturing methods which are no longer in use. Wanting so badly to buy that propaganda, I thought, "that's great we don't have to worry about this one".

But guess what, one of the studies, which was released last Monday, was a solid scientific study which has been peer reviewed and the other study actually took 55 products off of grocery store shelves in the Twin Cities last Fall and found mercury contamination in 1 out of every 3 products. Where is the Corn Refiners Association studies? Oh that's right they have none. I love their commercials, too, which try to make people feel stupid for questioning the safety of HFCS if they do not have a full understanding of exactly why it could potentially be harmful.

But you see this is a totally different issue than obesity or heart disease concerns from HFCS;which have still not been directly correlated to HFCS through peer reviewed, scientific studies. “Mercury is toxic in all its forms,” said IATP’s David Wallinga, M.D. (Director of Food and Health at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy), and a co-author in both studies. “Given how much high fructose corn syrup is consumed by children, it could be a significant additional source of mercury never before considered. We are calling for immediate changes by industry and the FDA to help stop this avoidable mercury contamination of the food supply.”

Dufault et al. found detectable levels of mercury in nine of 20 samples of commercial HFCS. Dufault was working at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration when the tests were done in 2005. She and co-authors concluded that possible mercury contamination of food chemicals like HFCS was not common knowledge within the food industry that frequently uses the sweetener. While the FDA had evidence that commercial HFCS was contaminated with mercury four years ago,the agency did not inform consumers, help change industry practice or conduct additional testing. This should be called criminal but instead we refer to it as Big Business.

This all comes down to what the FDA knew and was willing to do about the huge outdated chlorine-alkali plants worldwide that make a lot of chemicals commonly used in food production;including the production of HFCS. These plants use outdated technology based on mercury cells. This is only one type of food processing technology, out of three, that can be used.

This mercury contaminated food supply has been an open secret in the industry.

These companies have been polluters of our environment by putting mercury into our environment and they knew that the food grade chemicals coming out of the plant could be contaminated as well. They, along with the FDA chose to ignore the possibility that we are getting significant amounts of mercury through our contaminated food chemicals. The FDA's problems speak for themselves as they basically said last week that they were too busy with the peanut recall to be concerned with the mercury in HFCS.

In 2007, then Senator Obama Co-Sponsored Senate Legislation that would have phased out the use of mercury in making caustic soda in U.S. plants. That legislation did not pass. I can only hope now that we have President Obama, he will remember his legislation from 2007 and act to outlaw, outdated food processing which utilizes mercury cells. Please write your congressional representatives and express your concern over our mercury contaminated food supply and tell your friends and family that this is a real risk to their health.

In the meantime, do what I have done and try to completely eliminate HFCS from your diet and your family's diet. This is not a joke or a biased study based on a whim. These my friends are facts. You are now informed. You do not even need to decide whether or not to follow the Precautionary Principle as this info is based on solid scientific data. What you do with this information, could make a difference to your future health and the future health of our country.