Speaker 1: All right, This would is for the baby conspiracy realist
Speaker 1: in the crowd. Welcome to planet Earth. Hope it still
Speaker 1: has that new car smell. Hope you're at a honeymoon period.
Speaker 1: Sorry about all the terrible stuff that happened before you
Speaker 1: were bored, but we hope you like baby food.
Speaker 2: Oh man, you know it's there's certain flavors of baby
Speaker 2: food that I think are yummy even to grown kidding.
Speaker 2: I just always liked the problem, you know, when there
Speaker 2: was like a kind of a porridge kind of thing.
Speaker 2: I enjoyed even that when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: Gogurt is baby food marketed to adults.
Speaker 2: Gogurt slaps and things like cream of wheat. But you know,
Speaker 2: we've talked often on the pod about a time before
Speaker 2: you know, very rigorous standards regarding packaging and then some
Speaker 2: of the you know, aspirin poisoning, you know, epidemics and
Speaker 2: various instances of product tampering. Who is more vulnerable in
Speaker 2: that regard than you know, the humans, the tiny humans
Speaker 2: that can see baby.
Speaker 3: Food and the adult parents that are attempting to get
Speaker 3: whatever the healthiest thing is they can afford for their child, right,
Speaker 3: And those are two different things the thing they can
Speaker 3: afford and the healthiest thing, and you try and find
Speaker 3: the medium the median in there somewhere. Guys. There, this
Speaker 3: is twenty twenty one when we talked about this. I'm
Speaker 3: looking at a CBS News article from March of this year,
Speaker 3: twenty twenty six, saying some baby formula brands contain lead, arsenic,
Speaker 3: and other heavy metals according to consumer reports. It's not
Speaker 3: like this is something that's gone away that we covered
Speaker 3: back then, you.
Speaker 1: Know, yeah, because we found that numerous baby food products,
Speaker 1: especially in the United States, contain ingredients that are not
Speaker 1: only bad for the kiddos, but are things that you
Speaker 1: will not see on the label, stuff like mercury, lead, arsenic,
Speaker 1: et cetera, et cetera at all. So in twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: we asked how long has this been occurring, what did
Speaker 1: the manufactures know exactly, and when did they learn that?
Speaker 1: Is there a conspiracy afoot?
Speaker 2: Yeah, guys, I know I led with this idea of
Speaker 2: tampering with baby food. We're talking about stuff not even
Speaker 2: requiring tampering. We're talking about stuff that ends up in
Speaker 2: there unbeknownst to the consumer from the companies themselves, who
Speaker 2: are supposed to be you know, legitimate and looking after
Speaker 2: their end consumer, which would be in this case, babies.
Speaker 2: But there have been examples of folks purposefully contaminating baby
Speaker 2: food as well.
Speaker 1: But that's not exactly the throw of this episode.
Speaker 3: Do you guys remember if this one covers baby formula
Speaker 3: as well or this is just like the jar baby
Speaker 3: food kind of stuff. I just can't remember if we
Speaker 3: because I know, baby formula is a whole other bag
Speaker 3: of badgers. Hopefully we talked about a little bit in
Speaker 3: this one, but remember when we looked back at that, guys,
Speaker 3: I can't remember we've done a full episode.
Speaker 1: Oh, baby formula.
Speaker 2: It has always been a bit controversial, I mean there,
Speaker 2: you know. I mean, obviously a lot of mothers, new
Speaker 2: mothers would prefer to be able to breast but because
Speaker 2: there are sometimes extenuating circumstances that make that difficult or impossible,
Speaker 2: I know that typically formula is considered, you know, the
Speaker 2: second choice, and there are reasons for that, not necessarily contamination,
Speaker 2: but even just how it can affect the health of
Speaker 2: a growing child versus breastfeeding.
Speaker 1: And we do indeed talk about infant formula in this episode,
Speaker 1: and as as we had pointed out here, folks, there
Speaker 1: is a hard and disturbing argument that the situation hasn't
Speaker 1: changed or hasn't improved that much over these past five years.
Speaker 3: Well and look up Abbott Labs. That's happening right now
Speaker 3: with bacterial contamination in baby formula. It's crazy.
Speaker 1: And let's roll the tape.
Speaker 4: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
Speaker 4: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 4: learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 4: production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt.
Speaker 1: Our compatriot Noel is on adventures, but will be returning.
Speaker 1: They called me Ben. We're joined as always with our
Speaker 1: super producer. All mission control decands, most importantly, you are you,
Speaker 1: You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
Speaker 1: want you to know. Now, Matt, I don't.
Speaker 4: Often say this.
Speaker 1: Because I don't want to be alarmist, but today's episode
Speaker 1: is something that everyone needs to pay close attention to.
Speaker 1: This is an ongoing situation. This is a serious situation,
Speaker 1: and it's one, frankly, that we could use your help with.
Speaker 1: We meaning not just Matt and Paul and myself but everyone,
Speaker 1: especially parents with young children. Let's start with something wholesome.
Speaker 1: You will be glad we did, I can assure you so, Matt,
Speaker 1: you remember the Gerber Baby.
Speaker 3: I do remember the Gerber Baby. I've recently seen the
Speaker 3: Gerber baby as of several years ago, when I was
Speaker 3: taking their products and putting them into my son.
Speaker 1: Yes. Yeah, the Gerber Baby is probably one of the
Speaker 1: most famous babies in modern history, and like the Marlborough
Speaker 1: Man of old, the Gerber Baby is actually several different
Speaker 1: babies since nineteen twenty eight or so, the companies used
Speaker 1: this adorable face of this tyke to sell their products
Speaker 1: to parents around the US and the world. The interesting fact,
Speaker 1: for a long time, the identity of the actual baby
Speaker 1: was a secret until the late seventies, but as the
Speaker 1: years went on, the company began holding these wildly popular
Speaker 1: contests to choose the next Gerber Baby. So there are
Speaker 1: probably people in the crowd today who were contestants in that,
Speaker 1: you know, without their consent, of course, was their parents
Speaker 1: or people who have said, hey, my baby's cute. Maybe
Speaker 1: my baby is Gerber Baby cute. In some ways, it's
Speaker 1: like this American tradition now, and it's probably going to
Speaker 1: stand the test of time, But not for the reason
Speaker 1: you might think it's going to stand the test of time,
Speaker 1: because nowadays Gerber is a subsidiary of another much much
Speaker 1: larger company.
Speaker 3: Yeah, one that we've talked about before. For us, it
Speaker 3: was in the context of water, which they're very much
Speaker 3: known for, and there's also a lot of water in
Speaker 3: Gerber products, But that doesn't mean that why we're talking
Speaker 3: about them. The company you'll remember is Nestley, known.
Speaker 1: For their chocolate, the activities they engage in to get
Speaker 1: that chocolate from a bean state to your local grocery store.
Speaker 1: Known of course for bottled water, and their extensive work
Speaker 1: in that regard. We've covered these, as Matt said in
Speaker 1: previous episodes, but did you know, conspiracy realists that Nesley
Speaker 1: is also this country's largest purveyor of babyfood, just the
Speaker 1: umbrella term baby food. That's where our story begins. It's
Speaker 1: a story that we have all been characters in. Whether
Speaker 1: our part in the story started when we were four
Speaker 1: to six months of age, when babies typically begin eating
Speaker 1: solid food, or whether our story starts later in life
Speaker 1: when we were parents, babysitters, elder siblings, or guardians. This
Speaker 1: industry at some point in some way affects every single
Speaker 1: person on the planet. So let's talk about it. Let's
Speaker 1: dive in. Here are the facts.
Speaker 3: Baby food, Yeah, baby food. A lot of times the
Speaker 3: first food is milk from your mother. If you're a mammal,
Speaker 3: that's generally how the story goes. But for a myriad
Speaker 3: of reasons, that's not always in the cards for everyone.
Speaker 3: So there are things like baby products, baby formula, baby food,
Speaker 3: and like Ben said, around four to six months, that
Speaker 3: food starts to change. And my goodness, we were all
Speaker 3: babies and we all need food, and it is a
Speaker 3: difficult thing to make baby food for your own child
Speaker 3: on a daily, weekly, monthly basis. So that and that
Speaker 3: means there's a lot of baby food, and it means
Speaker 3: that it's a large market essentially, lots of people trying
Speaker 3: to buy different baby food, which means it's a huge
Speaker 3: competitive industry, lots of companies trying to buy for that
Speaker 3: market share. And retail sales in the baby food segment
Speaker 3: were about seventy one point four billion US dollars in
Speaker 3: twenty eighteen. Wow, And it's expected that in three years
Speaker 3: that number seventy one point four billion dollars will jump
Speaker 3: to ninety eight point nine billion dollars, and that jump
Speaker 3: is a whole bunch of reasons, everything from inflation to
Speaker 3: the number of people actually eating the baby food. There's
Speaker 3: a bunch of stuff that goes into that projection. But
Speaker 3: it is going to grow, and.
Speaker 1: We're getting some of these from STATISTICA. So those numbers
Speaker 1: you just heard are us. But this projection, this projection
Speaker 1: has a lot of different factors that can come into play.
Speaker 1: I love that you pointed that out, Matt. We're not
Speaker 1: just talking about projected berths. We're also talking about parts
Speaker 1: of the world where people have rising income. So people
Speaker 1: who are traditionally having to make baby food at home
Speaker 1: can maybe now spend a little bit more of that
Speaker 1: extra income at the grocery store buying these products in
Speaker 1: In twenty nineteen, China officially became the largest single market
Speaker 1: for baby food. India comes in second place. The US
Speaker 1: ranks sixth one. Incredibly depressing US baby food fact I
Speaker 1: found because as you know, I'm not conventionally reading about
Speaker 1: baby food. Baby food, dude, it is one of the
Speaker 1: most frequently shoplifted items in the entirety of the US.
Speaker 2: That is a.
Speaker 1: Statement that is true and has an anthology of heartbreaking
Speaker 1: stories behind it. You know, it reminds me of that
Speaker 1: old short story that's so often attributed unprovably to Hemingway
Speaker 1: for sale baby shoes never worn.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, anyway, you got it right, And it's not
Speaker 3: always shoplifting. Many times it's oh wow, this kid grew
Speaker 3: a lot faster than we expected. My son went, I
Speaker 3: think he had. He's had two pairs of shoes now
Speaker 3: that we bought for him. He tried them on, wore
Speaker 3: them for about a week, and then it was over
Speaker 3: and he couldn't wear them anymore. And that's just how
Speaker 3: it goes. But yeah, you're right. There are a lot
Speaker 3: of reasons why, through circumstance, you may have to turn
Speaker 3: to getting food for your baby, or you know something
Speaker 3: that you need for your baby and you just can't
Speaker 3: afford it. It's terrible.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Necessity is one of the greatest motivators for the breaking
Speaker 1: of social norms, right or the breaking of laws. So
Speaker 1: let's look at the players in the baby food industry
Speaker 1: right now. If you look at baby food in general,
Speaker 1: and you include infant formula, which can replace the mother's
Speaker 1: milk that you have mentioned Matt. You'll see that this
Speaker 1: market is largely dominated by three outfits. Nessley, a group
Speaker 1: called Breckett Benkiser also known as Mead Johnson, and another
Speaker 1: one that I wasn't too familiar with. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you had heard of the Matt Dnone, Danone.
Speaker 3: No, I know Danon, I don't know da n n E.
Speaker 3: Not sure about them. But yeah, together those three firms
Speaker 3: control forty five percent of the global market share when
Speaker 3: it comes to this stuff. That's that's a lot of
Speaker 3: control for three companies.
Speaker 1: Oh also fact check fact check Live, which we usually
Speaker 1: don't have to do. It's a French company. It's pronounced
Speaker 1: oh so so sorry about that for anybody who is
Speaker 1: going to hear the conspiracy we're unraveling, and their primary
Speaker 1: objection would be the mispronunciation. There if that's what we
Speaker 1: got in front of that, Yeah, think about that. They
Speaker 1: control almost half of the global market share. There are
Speaker 1: other players in the game, of course, but these are
Speaker 1: the titans of this industry. Ingredients regulations, all right, let's
Speaker 1: say it. Baby food I just always assumed was not
Speaker 1: considered particularly appetizing to many adults or many kids for
Speaker 1: that matter. I was somewhat incorrect in that assumption. I
Speaker 1: found that there there's a a whole wealth of literature
Speaker 1: of recipes that use baby food as ingredients for adults,
Speaker 1: and there's some adults.
Speaker 2: Like baby food.
Speaker 1: Either way, it's not going to hurt you if you
Speaker 1: eat it as an adult. It does play this vital
Speaker 1: role in childhood development. Like you were saying, Matt, and
Speaker 1: I remember you know, when your son was even younger,
Speaker 1: you were like, this kid is growing so fast. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: that's wholesome and heartwarm, mean, and you're like, no, dude,
Speaker 1: I have to buy clothes and stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like right right now, he's out of clothes
Speaker 3: essentially because he's outgrown them over the past couple of months.
Speaker 3: And my goodness it is. It's not cheap, you guys.
Speaker 3: Thank goodness for places. Oh I'm in a blank on
Speaker 3: the name.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: Kid to kid I think is what it's called. Places
Speaker 3: like that where it's hand me down clothes that because
Speaker 3: all these parents, everyone, you are probably in the same
Speaker 3: situation out there where you just you need to get
Speaker 3: rid of these clothes. You need to get new clothes.
Speaker 3: You can trade them. Kid to kid not sponsored by them,
Speaker 3: but they're great. It is so true, and this baby
Speaker 3: food is highly important, as you said, for the for
Speaker 3: the nutrition of these children. And I'm gonna have to
Speaker 3: point out some of the newer baby foods, at least
Speaker 3: newer to me since I become a parent, are actually
Speaker 3: pretty good. It's essentially like a fruit and vegetable smoothie,
Speaker 3: but it's more of a puree than a you know,
Speaker 3: a juice or something. And it's actually pretty tasty because
Speaker 3: it's just you know, you're getting actual strawberries in there.
Speaker 3: It's not so bad. At least it doesn't taste immediately
Speaker 3: so bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there we go. I mean, kids, human kids grow
Speaker 1: at a break deck and need a steady supply of
Speaker 1: nutritious food. This is not a hot take. The multiple
Speaker 1: a multitude of studies show that a lack of proper nutrition,
Speaker 1: even in one specific area or another, can have these
Speaker 1: damaging permanent effects on people throughout the rest of their lives.
Speaker 1: Malnutrition is a great example, like if you look at
Speaker 1: certain generations of people born in South Korea and people
Speaker 1: born in the DPRK, you'll notice that there is an observable,
Speaker 1: statistically consistent difference in height because residents of the DPRK
Speaker 1: the vast majority for a time where lavery under food
Speaker 1: and security. So everybody knows this is true. Everybody knows.
Speaker 1: This is not the part that's a hot take. These
Speaker 1: are just the facts, folks. In the US, there's an
Speaker 1: outfit called the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.
Speaker 1: They're responsible for the regulation of infant formula, specifically amit,
Speaker 1: a number of other things. So we have people with
Speaker 1: eyes on this, and even the most extreme opponents of
Speaker 1: big government in the audience, even the most extreme of
Speaker 1: libertarians can see the value inherent in having some sort
Speaker 1: of authority keeping eye on food manufacturers here. So this
Speaker 1: should be the opposite of a hot button or controversial issue.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, of course, why would there be any problems here?
Speaker 3: I mean, right, there is a problem, and it's a
Speaker 3: problem that's been around for a while, and we're going
Speaker 3: to tell you exactly what it is and how bad
Speaker 3: it is. Right after a word from our sponsor.
Speaker 4: Here's where it gets crazy.
Speaker 1: So contamination baby food.
Speaker 4: It's a real thing.
Speaker 1: It's not some alarmist opinion whatever. There was a landmark
Speaker 1: congressional study just released earlier this month. As Matt and
Speaker 1: I record this on February fourth, twenty twenty one, Congress
Speaker 1: found that despite the existence of some regulations, literal tons
Speaker 1: and tons and tons of baby food products are contaminated
Speaker 1: such that you probably want to think twice before you
Speaker 1: give them to your children. This wasn't an isolated incident, folks.
Speaker 1: This was not like Company A, some factory for Company
Speaker 1: A had a bad day, or got some crap carrots
Speaker 1: and used them anyway, or some apple cherry puree. I
Speaker 1: don't even know if that's a thing, Matt. But instead
Speaker 1: this study, they found that a wealth of baby food
Speaker 1: products are contaminated with something called toxic heavy metals inorganic arsenic, lead, cadmium,
Speaker 1: and mercury in particular.
Speaker 3: And these aren't the only toxic heavy metals that historically
Speaker 3: have been found in foods, especially in baby foods, but
Speaker 3: these four are the ones that are focused on in
Speaker 3: this congressional study, and the four metals they're bad, you guys.
Speaker 3: All four are considered by the WHO to be the
Speaker 3: top in the top ten chemicals of concern when it
Speaker 3: comes to children, infants, and younger younger children. All of
Speaker 3: them have been linked to things like cancer, chronic diseases.
Speaker 3: Of all sorts, neurotoxic effects, learning disabilities, all kinds of
Speaker 3: things and their detrimental effects are way worse for developing brains,
Speaker 3: for young brains as compared to adults, and you know,
Speaker 3: grown grown folk such as us. It's I am again
Speaker 3: in this episode. We're going to make a little bit
Speaker 3: light of some of this in order to get through it.
Speaker 3: But this is very, very serious, and we're gonna take
Speaker 3: it seriously.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean consider, I know, as soon as a
Speaker 1: lot of us heard that the L word, as soon
Speaker 1: as a lot of us heard led and babyfood, were
Speaker 1: thinking of the longitudinal studies linking crime to early lead
Speaker 1: exposure right often through pipes, I mean, water systems and
Speaker 1: so on. But yeah, it gets worse, It gets much
Speaker 1: much worse. According to Representative Rajah Krishna Morti, who is
Speaker 1: the chairman of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy,
Speaker 1: the congressional investigation that the subcommittee conducted quote revealed that
Speaker 1: manufacturers knowingly sell, not sold knowingly sell tainted baby food
Speaker 1: to unsuspecting parents in spite of internal company test results
Speaker 1: showing high levels of these toxic metals without any warning
Speaker 1: labels right, which from a pure profit motive makes sense.
Speaker 1: You're a parent, you're going to you have to buy
Speaker 1: some kind of baby food. You pick up two items
Speaker 1: next to each other on the shelf. You'll flip them around,
Speaker 1: look at the ingredients, and one of them has a
Speaker 1: warning that says may contain lead. Which one are you
Speaker 1: going to go for?
Speaker 3: You know, yeah, or you know may contain lead, arsenic, cadmium,
Speaker 3: and other terrible things like mercury. Yeah, you're not gonna
Speaker 3: buy that. And there we're gonna we're gonna break this
Speaker 3: stuff down even further in their reasons why there are
Speaker 3: no labels on there, and there are also reasons why
Speaker 3: that the testing that is done by these companies is flawed. Uh,
Speaker 3: But for now, what it does mean is that the
Speaker 3: manufacturers of a lot of these baby foods were aware
Speaker 3: that these substances were in their products, and they still
Speaker 3: let let them get purchased, and they still manufactured them,
Speaker 3: and they just kept going because that they knew that
Speaker 3: there were potential dangers. And it doesn't mean that these
Speaker 3: at least right now. If you're a parent listening to
Speaker 3: this and you probably just fed your child something from
Speaker 3: beech Nut or Gerber or whoever it was, it doesn't
Speaker 3: mean your baby is immediately in peril because of this.
Speaker 3: It doesn't mean your child is at risk right now,
Speaker 3: in this moment because you've fed them one thing of
Speaker 3: baby food. But it does mean feeding them over time
Speaker 3: could be a real risk. And the companies that sold
Speaker 3: it to you knew.
Speaker 1: Nikes and kept doing it, not just in the US,
Speaker 1: but around the world. They're explicitly aware of the potential
Speaker 1: dangers here. So according to a guy named doctor Leonardo Tressande,
Speaker 1: who is a professor of pediatrics at the NYU Grossman
Speaker 1: School of Medicine also the director of the Center for
Speaker 1: the Investigation of Environmental Hazards over at NYU. According to
Speaker 1: this doctor, critics have been raising concerns about the possibility
Speaker 1: of this contamination for years. This is not breaking news
Speaker 1: to the public. I mean it definitely wasn't breaking news
Speaker 1: to the companies. In twenty seventeen, there was a nonprofit
Speaker 1: organization still around called Clean Label Project, and they release
Speaker 1: findings from a study they had commissioned that showed the
Speaker 1: same thing we're talking about today. I think they focused
Speaker 1: specifically on arsenic lead and mercury and their findings and
Speaker 1: they found these again in the leading brand, brand name
Speaker 1: products for infant formula and baby food. And then there
Speaker 1: was another study that came out just last year. Wait, nope,
Speaker 1: two years ago, now twenty twenty one. This came out
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, study from Healthy Babies Bright Futures came out
Speaker 3: in October of twenty nineteen. They took it a step
Speaker 3: further from the twenty seventeen study. They looked at one
Speaker 3: hundred and sixty eight baby foods. They were looking for
Speaker 3: the same stuff Arsenic led Mercury Academium, and they found
Speaker 3: some terrible things. And right now, if you go online
Speaker 3: and search I think how I found it was toxic
Speaker 3: baby food twenty nineteen, that's a good way to find it.
Speaker 3: Or just look up that organization, Healthy Baby's Bright Futures,
Speaker 3: you can find what we're about to tell you. They
Speaker 3: found ninety five percent of all of these foods that
Speaker 3: they tested contained at least one of the heavy metals,
Speaker 3: and one in four of the baby foods contained all four.
Speaker 3: So a quarter of that one hundred and sixty eight
Speaker 3: different types of baby food contained all four heavy metals.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and amid these metals, lead was the worst offender.
Speaker 1: So we know a lot about how lead can affect
Speaker 1: developing human minds. Ninety four percent of the baby foods
Speaker 1: tested contained some degree of lead. Cadmium, and arsenic followed.
Speaker 1: They were in about three quarters around three quarters of
Speaker 1: all the baby food tested. And you always thinking that
Speaker 1: maybe there's a way for manufacturers to spin things that
Speaker 1: contain I don't think you could get away with this
Speaker 1: with lead, too many people know about it.
Speaker 3: But what if you.
Speaker 1: Change the label to now with ten percent more cadmium.
Speaker 1: Cadmium sounds just enough like calcium that people would be fooled.
Speaker 3: If you used a selective font, you can probably get
Speaker 3: away with it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, make it papylous, make it something classy. Right, So,
Speaker 1: mercury was the least common of these. Mercury was in
Speaker 1: less than a little less than one third of the
Speaker 1: food tested, so comparatively, I guess that's not so bad.
Speaker 3: This is dark.
Speaker 1: But you can find like one other thing they found
Speaker 1: that is useful for any parent listening today is that
Speaker 1: some foods were more likely to have this stuff. And
Speaker 1: we'll also explain why later in today's episode.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, we'll talk about rice in particular, which is
Speaker 3: something that tends to have more arsenic, so rice based
Speaker 3: cereals and snacks were particularly high in this stuff. In juices, dude,
Speaker 3: there have been so many studies over the years about juices,
Speaker 3: and it's for the same things we're going to talk
Speaker 3: about today, the same processes that these heavy metals get
Speaker 3: into these products. We're going to tell you about that.
Speaker 3: But juices, Good lord, Cranberry juice, you guys, was my
Speaker 3: absolute all time favorite thing for so many years, and
Speaker 3: now I'm just thinking twice. I feel like my IQ
Speaker 3: has been reduced several points, at least according to some
Speaker 3: of the studies, because of the amount of cranberry juice
Speaker 3: I have taken into my body.
Speaker 1: Well wait, wait, doctors recommend cranberry juice for people with
Speaker 1: kidney problems.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, and guess where heavy metals go your kidneys.
Speaker 3: I'm just choking. Oh god, I'm just joking. I'm kind
Speaker 3: of joking about that part. But I really did drink
Speaker 3: a lot of cranberry juice. Another thing, are like tubers,
Speaker 3: especially sweet potatoes, things that grow in the ground, root vegetables, carras,
Speaker 3: et cetera. They can be especially dangerous as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which has got to be a surprise for a
Speaker 1: lot of us, because rice snacks are often sold as
Speaker 1: a healthy alternative right to various things. And of course
Speaker 1: they're all over I almost said the cereal community. They're
Speaker 1: all over the big cereal brands, you know, because rice
Speaker 1: is an inexpensive food stuff and it can be very nutritious.
Speaker 1: So four of the seven rice cereals that are specifically
Speaker 1: for infants that this study tested contained inorganic arsenic, and
Speaker 1: that's the more toxic form of this metal. The levels
Speaker 1: of our arsenic, of this type of arsenic that we're
Speaker 1: in there, exceeded the FDA's proposed limit of one hundred
Speaker 1: parts per billion. So the FDA for this arsenic for
Speaker 1: this case does have a proposed limit, which is, hey, guys,
Speaker 1: like you're talking to loud kids at a dorm, Hey guys,
Speaker 1: keep your arsenic levels down to one hundred parts per billion.
Speaker 3: We're going to talk about the FDA and baby foods, right, Okay, yeah, yeah, good.
Speaker 1: Only there is a little bit of light the tunnel,
Speaker 1: but it's faint and it's distant. Of the one hundred
Speaker 1: and sixty eight baby foods tested, some were found not
Speaker 1: to contain traces of any of these four metals. Exactly,
Speaker 1: nine baby foods of one hundred and sixty eight were
Speaker 1: found to be clean. So these studies are in large
Speaker 1: part what prompted this congressional investigation. And in the course
Speaker 1: of this investigation, the Congress has seven of the largest
Speaker 1: baby food producers in the US to give their own
Speaker 1: internal documents and their own test results because naturally, you know,
Speaker 1: part of being a food company and selling to the
Speaker 1: public means that you have to have internal testing. There
Speaker 1: are safety standards of some sort you have to meet.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing, though, Matt. Four companies replied to the request, Nurture, Beechnut, Haine,
Speaker 1: and Gerber, but a couple of companies just didn't do it.
Speaker 1: Imagine that, like, what level are you at when Congress
Speaker 1: ask you for something and you go, eh, well.
Speaker 3: You're at Walmart level right, Specifically Sure, which is one
Speaker 3: of the companies that did not respond. Also Campbell, like
Speaker 3: Campbell Soup, they produce quite a bit of baby food,
Speaker 3: as well as Sprout Organic Foods, which I have to
Speaker 3: say is one of the biggest brands that my family
Speaker 3: chose to feed our sun, which troubles me greatly, But
Speaker 3: that's okay, that's Okay, so, yeah, they didn't respond. They
Speaker 3: didn't they didn't give the investigators anything, and it made them,
Speaker 3: you know, the people who are looking into this quote
Speaker 3: greatly concerned.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's that is a verbatim quote, but it
Speaker 1: doesn't quite nail the reaction that people would be having.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: So, several of the companies we should note to be
Speaker 1: fair I have released public statements in response to this
Speaker 1: or have responded to members of the media asking them
Speaker 1: about it. You can read those statements online. They are
Speaker 1: pretty much exactly what you expect, which is the gist
Speaker 1: is we test rigorously for any materials or anything that
Speaker 1: can't legally be included in this stuff. Or the way
Speaker 1: it'll sometimes be phraised is we rigidly adhere to all federal.
Speaker 3: Guidelines, yeah, or FDA standards or something like that. And
Speaker 3: one of the major things you'll read in these statements
Speaker 3: is that they test each product as it comes in.
Speaker 3: So one of the major things we're going to continue
Speaker 3: on here is that they test the carrot when it
Speaker 3: comes in and gets ready for the manufacturing process. They
Speaker 3: test the apple, they test you know, the individual foods.
Speaker 3: The big question though, is are they actually testing the
Speaker 3: end product and where are those numbers, because that's what
Speaker 3: this investigation was, looking at the actual product.
Speaker 1: And the containers too. Yeah, that's how they would That's
Speaker 1: some of the metrics the studies use are some of
Speaker 1: the language. So specific. Examples of this kind of stuff include,
Speaker 1: of course, beechnut gerber that's a bummer, Plum Organics, parents' choice,
Speaker 1: many many, many, many more. And I know these names
Speaker 1: are familiar to a lot of folks listening to the
Speaker 1: show today, and maybe to my co host.
Speaker 3: Dude, I know the plumb Organics one too, Dude. As
Speaker 3: a parent, like you're trying to you're trying to give
Speaker 3: your kid the best stuff, no matter who you are,
Speaker 3: no matter where you are, you want to give your
Speaker 3: kid the best stuff you can afford. And you know
Speaker 3: the best foods. You have access to the healthiest things.
Speaker 3: And I swear to you, man, a lot of these
Speaker 3: foods market themselves, and they market themselves as being healthy.
Speaker 3: They convince you as a parent that you're doing the
Speaker 3: right thing. And I'm not saying that you're doing the
Speaker 3: wrong thing by feeding your kids these things. It's just
Speaker 3: a it feels like a real betrayal, knowing that they knew.
Speaker 1: Right right, And of course none of this is medical advice.
Speaker 1: We're just we're giving you the lay of the lay
Speaker 1: of this disturbing land. So how about this, We should
Speaker 1: point out that they're doubtlessly other products out there containing
Speaker 1: these poisons. This is the beginning of what may end
Speaker 1: up being an even larger list. We're going to pause
Speaker 1: for a word from our sponsor and will return to
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about how we as a society
Speaker 1: got here, the potential health effects, and what if anything
Speaker 1: you can do as an individual or your communities can
Speaker 1: do as a group to combat this problem.
Speaker 3: We're back.
Speaker 1: The danger here is not theoretical. The danger here is proven.
Speaker 1: It is clear these substances can cause harm to a
Speaker 1: baby's developing brain and nervous system, both while they're in
Speaker 1: utero and after birth. Impacts can include things like the
Speaker 1: permanent loss of intellectual capacity, and they've also been linked
Speaker 1: to things like ADHD or autism. All four of these
Speaker 1: antagonists in the story are linked to IQ loss from
Speaker 1: exposures early in life. The evidence is here, there's hard
Speaker 1: science behind it. The science behind it spans decades. The
Speaker 1: research is ongoing, and it keeps proving the same stuff
Speaker 1: there were at least twenty three studies published in the
Speaker 1: last seven or eight years that confirm the impact specifically
Speaker 1: of these toxic heavy metals on the healthy development of children.
Speaker 1: These studies are available. These studies are things that manufacturers
Speaker 1: of baby food would have been well aware of at
Speaker 1: the time, at least in part. It appears, according to
Speaker 1: congress because their own internal testing confirmed it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So let's now jump to the FDA and like,
Speaker 3: what do they say, what are the safe levels of
Speaker 3: some of these heavy metals? Are there any safe levels?
Speaker 3: What is that look like? How do you measure that
Speaker 3: kind of stuff? Well, in order to get a handle
Speaker 3: on this, we are forced to look at drinking water
Speaker 3: statistics and FDA FDA guidelines and a couple like EPA
Speaker 3: guidelines for drinking water. So, according to this Congressional report,
Speaker 3: and according to the Food and Drug Administration, the FDA
Speaker 3: has a limit allowable level of some of this stuff
Speaker 3: in bottled water. So when you're talking about when you're
Speaker 3: talking about arsenic, it's ten parts per billion of this
Speaker 3: inorganic arsenic, this particular type of the metal. When you're
Speaker 3: talking about lead, it's capped at five parts per billion.
Speaker 3: As the allowable amount and cadmium five parts per billion, okay,
Speaker 3: so really low ten five and five parts per billion
Speaker 3: to be safe in drinking water. The EPA, when it
Speaker 3: looks at this, has capped the allowable level of mercury
Speaker 3: in drinking water at two parts per billion. Again almost nothing,
Speaker 3: almost zero. But then we got to look at the
Speaker 3: test results of these baby foods and it is pretty
Speaker 3: astounding the levels that were found.
Speaker 1: Right, the test results for baby food and their ingredients,
Speaker 1: back to your earlier point, Matt, Congress says, they eclipse
Speaker 1: those levels. There are results that are up to ninety
Speaker 1: one times the allowable level of arsenic again embottled water,
Speaker 1: up to one hundred and seventy seven times the level
Speaker 1: of lead, sixty nine times nice the level of cadmium,
Speaker 1: and up to five times the level of mercury. And again,
Speaker 1: remember we said mercury is the one that seems to
Speaker 1: occur the least often. So why are we using bottled water?
Speaker 1: Why why did Matt, why did you say we're forced
Speaker 1: to use the standards for bottled water.
Speaker 3: Well, that's because there are no FDA standards for these
Speaker 3: heavy metals in baby food. They don't they don't exist.
Speaker 3: There are no standards for them.
Speaker 1: That's wild.
Speaker 3: Why because their babies?
Speaker 1: Sorry sorry Noye the FDA.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just it feels like insanity. I don't understand.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's unacceptable. And and you know, we want to
Speaker 1: be clear when we're talking about institutions doing this kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. We're not saying, uh, you working for the
Speaker 1: FDA or your friend working for the FDA is somehow
Speaker 1: inherently a bad person. These are things that happen collectively
Speaker 1: with institutions. There. Maybe there were some lobbyists putting their
Speaker 1: thumb on the scale. I would not at this point
Speaker 1: be in the least surprised. Maybe there was just an
Speaker 1: overwhelming amount of paperwork. But the end result is that
Speaker 1: kids are literally eating lead and catiumin or a snake
Speaker 1: in mercury. So that is where we are now. There
Speaker 1: are some proposed limits, but the FDA doesn't have these
Speaker 1: hard limits in That's why we had to compare it
Speaker 1: to bottled water. What is to be done? Well, As
Speaker 1: we said at the top, this does not have an
Speaker 1: easy answer. There's not one particular institution that can correct it.
Speaker 1: If the FDA came back today and said these levels
Speaker 1: have to be this, then manufacturers would of course be
Speaker 1: legally bound to scramble to meet those constraints. But look,
Speaker 1: it's so easy to make someone the bad guy. It's
Speaker 1: not as if these manufacturers are like sitting around on
Speaker 1: their coffee break from their Illuminati meeting or their Bohemian
Speaker 1: grove meeting and saying, you know what would be fine, Yeah,
Speaker 1: would be like a real kick for all of us.
Speaker 1: Since we're out of adrenochrome, why don't we just start
Speaker 1: adding stuff to baby food. They didn't think about it
Speaker 1: like that. They didn't scheme to purposefully put dangerous substances
Speaker 1: in your children's food. That food comes from somewhere else.
Speaker 1: It doesn't come from those factories, right, It comes from
Speaker 1: the soil, and that food grows in the soil using
Speaker 1: nutrients and using water. When the land and the water
Speaker 1: and the air are contaminated, then we are already starting
Speaker 1: out at a fundamental disadvantage in the supply chain. Even
Speaker 1: if you're a billion dollar company. Right now, there are
Speaker 1: only so many places in the world where you can
Speaker 1: get certain crops. It's true. That's just a reality. It's
Speaker 1: not a hot take. So these substances are also all
Speaker 1: elements that are occurring in the wild now because they've
Speaker 1: been frequently used in pesticides for like the last century
Speaker 1: or so, and they didn't ever go away. They're still
Speaker 1: in the soil, they're still in the groundwater, even if
Speaker 1: they stopped being used in pesticides decades ago. That doesn't mean,
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean the the missteps of the past were
Speaker 1: somehow negated and the bill bill in short comes due.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's very true. And there's also a lot of
Speaker 3: these particularly lead that were just pumped out into the
Speaker 3: air through automobiles for a long time. When you're thinking
Speaker 3: about diesel and the lead that was contained in there,
Speaker 3: lead paint, all kinds of lead products that just ended
Speaker 3: up in the environment. There are a lot of reasons
Speaker 3: that the soil itself, as you said, ben is going
Speaker 3: to be contaminated, because the air was contaminated, because the
Speaker 3: water was contaminated at some point, because X was contaminated
Speaker 3: at some point and continues to be polluted and contaminated,
Speaker 3: and it's it's it is a very tough situation. Knowing that,
Speaker 3: knowing that I think it's around one percent of the
Speaker 3: Earth's land area is actually able to be or to
Speaker 3: be used for producing crops. It's a very small amount
Speaker 3: of the earth that humanity can actually use to grow
Speaker 3: its food. And you know, what are you going to
Speaker 3: do when you can't use it? Let alone the whole
Speaker 3: Was it the phosphorus? Yeah's the phosphorus thing where we're
Speaker 3: running out. It really is on my mind.
Speaker 1: Dude, to take us in maybe a slightly less hopefully
Speaker 1: less depressing tangent. Did you know that phosphorus is being
Speaker 1: considered as one of the markers of possible life on
Speaker 1: other planets or intelligent life like in the search in
Speaker 1: the search for stuff, we've been the human species has
Speaker 1: been looking for evidence of water, evidence of other thing
Speaker 1: like carbon, et cetera. But phosphorus may end up being
Speaker 1: the key. It's more important than a lot of people think.
Speaker 3: And don't don't let them fool you, Ben, They're just
Speaker 3: looking for phosphorus so we can take it and bring
Speaker 3: it back here because we need it.
Speaker 1: Phosphorus heist down, I would be I would crew on
Speaker 1: that mission. According to the World Bank, the percentage of
Speaker 1: arable land the well percentage of the world's total land
Speaker 1: area that could be considered agricultural. It's pretty high. It's
Speaker 1: thirty seven point seven percent, But the part that can
Speaker 1: be considered arable land, which is what I think we're
Speaker 1: really talking about, is only ten point six percent, and
Speaker 1: that umber that number may decrease over time.
Speaker 3: Well a little better than one percent. So thank goodness, well,
Speaker 3: thank goodness for like.
Speaker 1: All right, but okay, so here's another question. If the
Speaker 1: FDA has not set those minimal levels. It's a messed
Speaker 1: up question, but it's on our show has to ask
Speaker 1: are these manufacturers breaking the law in their conspiracy to
Speaker 1: put profits over the health of children. It is a
Speaker 1: conspiracy totally, but is it an a legal conspiracy at
Speaker 1: this point?
Speaker 3: That's tough. I'll have them talk to my attorneys. Wait,
Speaker 3: I'll have to hire some attorneys. But yeah, I don't
Speaker 3: want to get sued by these guys, you know, by
Speaker 3: Big Baby. No, please not that.
Speaker 1: So there are advocates who believe that there's a strong
Speaker 1: legal case here. About a week after that report published
Speaker 1: earlier this February, a law firm got involved. Their name
Speaker 1: is balm hedlund Eristi and Goldman, and they have started
Speaker 1: accepting lawsuitcases about toxic baby food for parents who purchase
Speaker 1: food from any of those brands and have children who
Speaker 1: have been diagnosed with autism or ADHD attention deficit hyperd
Speaker 1: activity disorder. But again, but again, none of that cleanses
Speaker 1: the ecosystem of these contaminants. And from what we understand
Speaker 1: of the current science, nobody really knows how to one
Speaker 1: hundred percent get the genie back in the bottle here,
Speaker 1: or if there is a way, it's still largely theoretical,
Speaker 1: and multiple institutions are unwilling to bear the cost of
Speaker 1: the attempt itself. So the current hope right now, amidst
Speaker 1: the nonprofit groups, the concerned parents, the politicians, everybody, is
Speaker 1: that the findings of these and other studies might spur
Speaker 1: manufacturers to do more testing and to change their practices
Speaker 1: as much as possible to get these levels down. But
Speaker 1: then we have to ask, We have to ask about
Speaker 1: the other folks in the crowd, the other folks who
Speaker 1: are affected by this supply chain, the parents, Like, what
Speaker 1: if you are listening to this episode and this is
Speaker 1: the first time you're learning about this, your first question
Speaker 1: is what the hell do I do?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, what the hell do I do? And in order
Speaker 3: to discuss that, you have to talk about a few things.
Speaker 3: The first one is that it appears because of how
Speaker 3: these heavy metals function. We are talking about a cumulative
Speaker 3: effect when it comes to these things, and it's not
Speaker 3: a you get dosed one time by eating, you know,
Speaker 3: a particular baby food that has some arsenic in it,
Speaker 3: and then now your child has issues. The problem is
Speaker 3: it's cumulative. So I've been watching way too much daytime
Speaker 3: TV where they've had experts on talking about this. Ben,
Speaker 3: I've been watching so much. Do you remember that show
Speaker 3: that Doctors? They really Yeah, they did a fairly good
Speaker 3: job actually by having numerous experts on and getting some
Speaker 3: competing opinions here. But the takeaway from all of them together,
Speaker 3: I would say is that pediatricians say that you just
Speaker 3: need to if you are feeding your child baby food,
Speaker 3: you need to just limit the number of these things
Speaker 3: they're eating and supplement it with really fresh fruits generally,
Speaker 3: it's what they're saying, and grains not rice. That is
Speaker 3: just the first thing. I'm just going to put that
Speaker 3: out there. That's what I have heard, and that your
Speaker 3: child is not, you know, in danger just for eating
Speaker 3: you know, one pouch or whatever that has some of
Speaker 3: these metals in.
Speaker 1: It, right, right, This is not a death sentence. This
Speaker 1: is there's an accumulative aggregate effect at play with exposured
Speaker 1: almost any substance.
Speaker 3: But it does make it there's a trust issue then
Speaker 3: that I have, at least personally when it comes to
Speaker 3: this stuff, because as a parent, it feels like my trust,
Speaker 3: like the trust between me and these baby food manufacturers
Speaker 3: has been broken. Then it's making me question, you know,
Speaker 3: the advice I'm getting from daytime TV experts who are
Speaker 3: being paid to go on television and you know who
Speaker 3: a lot of times are sponsored by these big companies.
Speaker 3: So it's tough to know. It's really tough to know.
Speaker 3: The good thing is that there are all kinds of
Speaker 3: resources out there online that you can check out. You
Speaker 3: can educate yourself, and you can make the best decisions,
Speaker 3: you know, at least for that you can for you
Speaker 3: and your family.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, And some of the nonprofits we mentioned earlier
Speaker 1: have have advice as well on how to combat the
Speaker 1: rate of heavy metal consumption by exactly as you described, Matt,
Speaker 1: finding safer alternatives to baby foods that may be on
Speaker 1: these lists or found to contain these substances, you know,
Speaker 1: oatmeal instead of rice, cereal, or barley, et cetera. Maybe
Speaker 1: frozen bananas to replace teething cookies or biscuits. However, as
Speaker 1: any current or expecting parent knows, the world is full
Speaker 1: of advice for you. The cup of unsolicited parenting advice
Speaker 1: runneth over, you know, like, and these sources of advice
Speaker 1: are not created equally. Don't be fooled. I mean you
Speaker 1: don't don't assume that everybody's automatically a bad actor. But
Speaker 1: don't let someone's opinion or persuasive writing fool you into
Speaker 1: thinking what you are reading is automatically factual. It stinks
Speaker 1: right now that the burden of research is on people
Speaker 1: who have often just entered the busiest time of their
Speaker 1: adult lives and are trying to like sleep occasionally. It
Speaker 1: stinks that part of that part of that burden falls
Speaker 1: on you as a parent, to do the digging, do
Speaker 1: the research. To not be afraid of writing directly to
Speaker 1: companies with questions if you don't feel like you're getting
Speaker 1: satisfactory answers searching online. I guarantee you these companies have
Speaker 1: people whose entire job, their full time job, is to
Speaker 1: field and answer these questions, so they will be there
Speaker 1: and then even if you find a blog that you
Speaker 1: really like, look for the science, look for the boring stuff,
Speaker 1: look for the numbers, look for the studies. That congressional
Speaker 1: report is available freely online. The studies that we mentioned
Speaker 1: are also freely available online. This stuff is not you know,
Speaker 1: this is not a secret military program. Hopefully this stuff
Speaker 1: should all be declassified and for public consumption. And now
Speaker 1: we arrive at your part of the story, fellow conspiracy realists.
Speaker 1: As Matt and I said at the top, we need
Speaker 1: your help. How do you think this contamination can or
Speaker 1: should be addressed? Do these companies owe any kind of
Speaker 1: compensation to the children and the parents involved? I mean,
Speaker 1: how would that even work? That's a huge question. And
Speaker 1: perhaps most importantly, do you have a personal story or
Speaker 1: experience you would like to share with us or your
Speaker 1: fellow listeners. If so, please let us know. We try
Speaker 1: to be easy to find online.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right. You can find us on Facebook and Twitter,
Speaker 3: where you are a conspiracy Stuff Conspiracy Stuff show. On Instagram,
Speaker 3: you can check out Here's where it Gets Crazy. That
Speaker 3: is our group on Facebook with by the way, some
Speaker 3: of the best mods on the planet, coolest human beings
Speaker 3: you will ever meet. Hopefully you won't cross them and
Speaker 3: have to meet them that way, you'll meet them in
Speaker 3: a happy way. And here's where it gets crazy. If
Speaker 3: you don't like using social media, well, hey, you can
Speaker 3: find us via phone.
Speaker 1: Yes, that's right, Matt. We have a phone number one
Speaker 1: eight three three st d wytk cal. You'll hear, you'll
Speaker 1: hear a voicemail message. You'll have three minutes. Those three
Speaker 1: minutes belong to you. We can't wait to hear from you.
Speaker 1: We have some tips for you that will help you
Speaker 1: help you get around some of the weirdness of speaking
Speaker 1: into the void for three minutes. First, go ahead and
Speaker 1: open with your name or your nickname and let us
Speaker 1: know whether or not you are okay with your voice
Speaker 1: and name being used on air or your nickname. Second,
Speaker 1: tell us what's going on, give us the scoop, give
Speaker 1: us the skinny, hip us, hip us to the story.
Speaker 1: And then third, if there's anything you want to just
Speaker 1: say to us, then leave that for the end. If
Speaker 1: it's something you just want Matt, Nole, Alexis or Paul
Speaker 1: or me to know. And then fourth, last thing most important,
Speaker 1: if there's a really long story that's on your mind,
Speaker 1: go ahead and write to us at our email address.
Speaker 1: We'll give you that email address. We made some pretty
Speaker 1: good progress I think, going through our voicemail queue, and you.
Speaker 3: Talk about you did Ben, you did that, dude, We
Speaker 3: thank you.
Speaker 1: We did it. And Matt had to be a one
Speaker 1: man army for a very long time. So we instituted
Speaker 1: something that without any hint of irony or pretension. We
Speaker 1: were calling operations scorched earth, voicemail.
Speaker 3: Scorched mail.
Speaker 1: That was better. We should have That's what we should
Speaker 1: have gotten with. But so we can't wait to hear
Speaker 1: from you. But if you do not feel comfortable with
Speaker 1: the social needs, if you don't really dig using the phone,
Speaker 1: totally get it. That's why we are always here for you.
Speaker 1: There's one easy way you can always contact us. That's
Speaker 1: our good fashioned email address.
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