Re: Hazardous vs. Radioactive Materials

[BERNARD L COHEN <blc+@PITT.EDU>]

On Sun, 9 Mar 2003 BLHamrick@AOL.COM wrote:



> This may be slightly off-topic for this list, but I was wondering if anyone

> knew of any specific hazardous materials (carcinogens) that are present in

> the natural background, as radioactive material is, and what the "background"

> risk levels might be for those hazardous materials.



	The following is from Am. Council on Science and Health

publications:



. All plants contain toxic chemicals to protect them from their natural

enemies. Many of these chemicals can cause cancer , like nitrosamines in

beets, celery and lettuce; aflotoxin in peanuts, corn, and milk;

sterigmatocystin in salami, ham, and wheat; hydrozines in mushrooms; allyl

isothiocyanate in mustard, broccoli, and cabbage; safrole in pepper;

tannins in coffee, tea, and wines; psoralens in celery and parsley; ethyl

carbamate in bread, yogurt, beer, and wine; formaldehyde in fruits;

benzene in eggs; methylene chloride in fats; coumarin in candy; diacetyl

in coffee and butter; and flavonoids in fruits and vegetables. These are

nature's pesticides, and per quantity ingested, they are typically as

carcinogenic as man-made pesticides. But our food contains  10,000 times

as much of nature's pesticides as of man-made pesticides.



************************************************************************

You are currently subscribed to the Radsafe mailing list. To unsubscribe,

send an e-mail to Majordomo@list.vanderbilt.edu  Put the text "unsubscribe

radsafe" (no quote marks) in the body of the e-mail, with no subject line.

You can view the Radsafe archives at http://www.vanderbilt.edu/radsafe/