“A chest x-ray gives about 0.01 rad of energy. The average dose of radiation from background radiation (radiation due to cosmic rays and natural radioactivity such as radon in rocks) annually is 0.1 rad. On the other hand, the dose of radiation from gamma rays applied to food during irradiation is 100,000 to 1 million rads (1-10 kGy). The amount of radiation being applied to food during irradiation is therefore massive, 10 million to 100 million times the dose of a chest x-ray... Food irradiation creates nuclear waste just like a nuclear power plant.”

– http://www.Citizen.Org/CMEP/FoodSafety/International/Canada/Articles.cfm?ID=9532

 

Irradiation of food is a form of pasteurization. It uses high doses of radiation to kill microbes in food. Specifically, irradiation is meant to kill bugs that can make humans sick, including (Escherichia coli) E. coli 0157, salmonella, shigella, and lysteria.

 

Not only does radiating food kill what may or may not be something that can cause human illness, it also kills enzymes, and damages some other nutrients, including thiamin, and vitamins E and A. It also exposes food to, you guessed it, radiation.

 

Food irradiation is a technology developed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Byproduct Utilization Program. The word “byproduct” in this case refers to leftovers of the nuclear industry. In this case, cesium 37 and cobalt 60.

 

Lots of food products sold in markets and distributed in school lunch programs are irradiated, or “cold-pasteurized.” Foods that have been imported, and foods being exported are also irradiated. This is done even though it is known that irradiation creates free radicals and radiolytic substances in the foods.

 

The E. coli outbreaks that have been used as an argument for radiating food are directly related to animal farms and factory animal farms polluting farmland and water.

 

The spinach that triggered the recall of spinach across the U.S. in 2006 was found to be contaminated with a strain of E. coli that originates in the intestines of cattle treated with massive doses of antibiotics. Growing cattle with high doses of antibiotics in their food creates a particularly harmful strain of bacteria – one that is resistant to common antibiotics.

 

At first the USDA said it was organic spinach that was contaminated with the E. coli. This got lots of people stop eating organic spinach, and was damaging to organic farmers and natural foods stores. After weeks, the USDA finally admitted that organic spinach wasn’t the culprit. This was after the damage had been done to the organic farming industry.

 

Many of the people who work for the USDA have worked for, or eventually work for, the large corporate farming companies, for some branch of the animal farming industry, for the industrialized food industry, and/or for the companies that produce farming chemicals.

 

Do you really want to be eating foods exposed to radiation, which accumulates in tissues? I don’t.

 

Irradiated foods are not labeled as such.

 

Ways of preventing irradiated foods from entering into your diet is to eat organically and locally grown foods, wildharvested foods, and to grow your own food.