Sweetened with Mercury

Sweetened with Mercury

For the past three years (http://sumocat.blogspot.com/search?q=HFCS), I've been highly suspicious of that wretched liquid sweetener known as high fructose corn syrup (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_fructose_corn_syrup). It's in too many food products, yet not available for purchase by itself. It's made from a grain, yet loaded with fructose -- fruit sugar. It's a cheap, subsidized alterative to tariff-inflated sugar. It's artificially synthesized from a natural product. And now, we know it's often contaminated with mercury.

A report published in Environmental Health (http://www.ehjournal.net/content/8/1/2), corroborated by the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (http://www.healthobservatory.org/library.cfm?refid=105026) (undoubtedly driven by an IATP member who is an author on the report), claims measurable amounts of mercury have been found in samples of HFCS, which the IATP has gone on to discover in off the shelf food products. The source? Mercury-grade caustic acid used to create HFCS.

It's an avoidable situation. Caustic acid doesn't have to be tainted with mercury, so it's not an inherent problem of HFCS. However, this problem has existed for years, so it would not surprise me if it has always been the case. This does not necessarily confirm my suspicion that HFCS manufacturers have been hiding something, but it certainly appears they had something to hide.
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