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Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey, brain Stuff

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Speaker 1: Florin vogel bomb here. There's been a lot of hype

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Speaker 1: over the years about the potential dangers of microwave popcorn,

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Speaker 1: But is this caution founded or just overblown fear mongering.

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Speaker 1: The short answer is that many of the chemicals that

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Speaker 1: caused concern in earlier decades have been removed from microwave popcorn,

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Speaker 1: but some critics are still not satisfied. Okay, a popcorn

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Speaker 1: is by itself a high fiber, whole grain, low calorie snack.

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Speaker 1: It can provide a lot of satisfying crunch bang for

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Speaker 1: its caloric buck right up until you douse it in butter. Anyway,

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Speaker 1: the original concern about it was not over an ingredient

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Speaker 1: in the popcorn itself, but rather in its packaging. That's

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Speaker 1: because microwave popcorn bags were coated with types of compounds

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Speaker 1: known as perfluorinated chemicals, or PFC to prevent grease from

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Speaker 1: leaking out. These compounds were being used as a grease

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Speaker 1: resisting agent in everything from sandwich bags to pizza boxes

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Speaker 1: to teflon pans. A one particular type of PFC, known

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Speaker 1: as C eight compounds or perfluorooctanoic acids has been linked

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Speaker 1: to certain cancers, though the American Cancer Society says that

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Speaker 1: the evidence is inconclusive and more research is being done

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Speaker 1: about this. Nevertheless, in response to concerns about PFCs, the

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Speaker 1: US Food and Drug Administration worked with popcorn manufacturers back

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Speaker 1: in twenty eleven to remove pfoas from their packaging. Three

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Speaker 1: other PFCs were banned in the next five years, so

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Speaker 1: today's microwave popcorn doesn't involve these chemicals, but critics say

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Speaker 1: that the replacement agents could be just as problematic as

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Speaker 1: the old ones, just with less known about them. And

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Speaker 1: that's not the only potential concern. Okay, the chemical that

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Speaker 1: for decades has lent butter flavored deliciousness to microwave and

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Speaker 1: movie popcorn is safe to eat, but it's been connected

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Speaker 1: in rare cases with major lung damage from breathing it

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Speaker 1: in a known as dicetyl. It's long been a documented

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Speaker 1: problem with workers in popcorn manufacturing facilities, so much so

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Speaker 1: that lung damage from it is known as popcorn lung.

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Speaker 1: But dicetyl can also be treacherous for people who just

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Speaker 1: eat the snack. A lot. A study published in twenty

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Speaker 1: thirteen in the International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health

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Speaker 1: compared three cases where consumers had similar exposure levels to

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Speaker 1: manufacturing workers. A different study found that more than eighty

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Speaker 1: percent of chemical emissions happened when the bag is first

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Speaker 1: opened post popping, and indeed, some of the bad cases

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Speaker 1: in consumers occurred when the consumer in question ate a

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Speaker 1: lot of microwave popcorn and specifically enjoyed inhaling those fresh fumes.

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Speaker 1: Diacetyl has also been removed from most products, though again

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Speaker 1: some critics claim that the replacement chemicals may also be harmful.

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Speaker 1: If this concerns you, I'll reiterate that most of the

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Speaker 1: exposure to diacetyl came from inhaling the fumes of rather

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Speaker 1: than eating the actual popcorn. Therefore, experts recommend waiting for

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Speaker 1: the bag to cool a little bit before you open

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Speaker 1: it to minimize potentially harmful chemical exposure. Also read the

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Speaker 1: microwave popcorn labels before buying. Although more research needs to

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Speaker 1: be done, products that contain just popcorn, oil and salt

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Speaker 1: are going to be baseline safer than products with various

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Speaker 1: flavorings and colorings added. Better yet, you can make your

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Speaker 1: own popcorn fresh at home on the stovetop, using an

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Speaker 1: air popping machine, or even using an untreated paper bag

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Speaker 1: in the microwave. When you sprinkle on your own melted butter, salts, ices,

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Speaker 1: or cheese, you'll at least know what you're getting into.

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Speaker 1: Today's episode is based on the article is microwave popcorn

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Speaker 1: really Dangerous? On how stuffworks dot com? Written by a

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Speaker 1: Leah Hoyt. Brain Stuff is production of iHeartRadio in partnership

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Speaker 1: with how stuffworks dot Com and is produced by Tyler Klang.

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Speaker 1: Before more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

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