Consumer Alert: The Food You Are Eating Is Killing You

I am an ardent enthusiast of books especially based on true stories. Tales of underdogs taking on the big boys are most intriguing for me, being an activist deep down.

One of my favorites is titled A Civil Action. Set in the 80s and authored by Jonathan Harr, this legal drama tells the story of lawyer Jan Schlitchmann who had a penchant for punching above his weight as far as civil litigation was concerned.

That notwithstanding, he was fairly successful at winning million dollar settlements and making a killing in the process. I will not be surprised if you were to confuse this story with that of John Grisham’s The Rain Maker.

That was until Jan was enlisted by a small community from Woburn, Massachusetts. This is after one of the community members; Anne Anderson’s child is diagnosed with Leukemia, a fairly rare condition in the community.

Upon further investigation, she discovered that there was a very high incidence of the same non-communicable disease among community members. Initially reluctant, Jan eventually takes the case and identifies trichloroethylene (TCE), an industrial solvent, as the suspect contaminant of a community aquifer that served all local wells.

The contamination is then attributed to Riley Tannery a subsidiary of Beatrice Foods; W.R. Grace and Unifirst; factories that used to operate within the neighborhood. Unifirst quickly settles for a million dollars and W.R. Grace yields to an eight million dollar settlement after much coaxing.

In the long run, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) after conducting its investigations found W.R, Grace and Beatrice Foods responsible for the contamination and were both collectively fined 68 million dollars. Though Jan did not make a dime from this particular case, it reveals the softer side of lawyers and the darker side of industrial malpractice that was making a killing literary.

More recently, a book by investigative journalist Nena Baker titled The Body Toxic got my attention as well. She introduces the term “chemical body burden”, a scientific term used to describe the level of chemical toxins that accumulate in the body over time. These toxins, scientists argue, may be the cause of the high incidence of developmental related conditions and non-communicable diseases like leukemia and cancer.

In one of the chapters, Nena paints a gloomy picture of the intensive use of herbicides and pesticides in commercial farming. According to the researchers she consulted, these chemicals are killing not just the weeds and the pests that they are intended to; they might also be killing everything else in their wake including us.

At the heart of this debate across the world are industrialization, mass production, commercial farming, and food distribution. These two stories tell of unscrupulous business practices that put consumers needlessly at risk and a regulatory framework that is either complicit or lacks the capacity to police and prosecute repeat offenders. In many ways, these books tell of incidences that are far and removed from our contemporary context. Unfortunately, we are mistaken because these bad business practices distressing the west have already been imported into the country; whilst the same lifestyle diseases plaguing the more affluent are increasingly becoming social economically neutral.

The revelations of a study undertaken by scholars at Egerton University two years ago are rather ominous. The research which focused on three locally consumed fresh vegetables’ value chain within Nakuru town collected samples from three popular vegetable markets.

Pesticide residue levels in horticultural products are highly regulated in international markets; this is not the case for locally consumed vegetables. The findings were worrisome because unsafe amounts of pesticide residues were found in all the samples.

The health effects of high doses of the most commonly used pesticides were suggested to be disruption of the normal functioning of the nerves system they may include but not limited to whole body tremors and seizures. It is important to note that these vegetal samples were compared with those grown organically and these particular samples were collected from Karen Organics, Carrefour Supermarket, and Kalimoni greens. The pesticides residues amounts in the later samples were found to be below detectable levels.

Lastly, an investigative piece by Dennis Okari aired just the other day adds gloom to an already sad story. In the feature, Dennis goes undercover to probe the going on of local meat retailing outfits and exposes a syndicate of heartless opportunists. In fact, this is not just sad, its criminal and somebody is liable. In the feature, he unearths the crude methods that retailers employ to preserve meat and extend its shelf life with little regard to the health risks this poses to consumers.

At the heart of this investigative piece is sodium metabisulphite (SMS), a popular meat perseverative. The feature reveals how major retailers illicitly procure this controlled substance and then proceed to use it as a meat preservative without adequate toxicity considerations. Samples of meat that Dennis took for testing at a local a lab had amounts of SMS that exceeded the recommended safe levels.

According to the feature, the use of SMS is strictly regulated in the US by the FDA. This is after 13 deaths were attributed to ingestion of meats treated with unsafe amounts of the controversial chemical in the late 90s. Health experts interviewed attributed the increase in incidences of pediatric respiratory allergies including asthma to its use as a preservative. Others even went further to claim that it may also cause cancer.

However, all is not lost because the digital sphere gives us the consumers, power. We no longer have to rely on lethargic third part actors to watch our back. With technology, we can take remedial action and report unethical actions that put consumers at risk through Consumer W@tch.

Consumer W@tch is a web-based, nonprofit, public interest network of Kenyan consumers that promotes healthy lifestyles, consumer rights to safe products and environment. It seeks to empower consumers to gain access to safe food and take charge of production systems. It seeks to address crucial issues around food safety, industrial agriculture, genetic engineering, children’s health, corporate accountability, Fair Trade, environmental sustainability, and pesticide use.

Our overall goal is to put the power of choice within consumers reach and their voice in the management of food systems.