Chuck Renaud asked about the possible added risk of cancer--albeit, still
unproved--from ethoxyquin, the food preservative often used in kibbled pet
food.  This started when Chuck quoted some literature from L'Avian pet food
stating that their food didn't contain ethoxyquin and that "while there
isn't 100% proof that ethoxyquin causes cancer, why take the chance?"
 
I responded that I thought the company's logic was highly specious and said
that it comes close to "that other famous leading question, 'When did you
stop beating your wife?'" And Chuck asked how I paired the two questions.
Here's the deal...(I feel like Ross Perot, suddenly--where are my flip
charts?)...cancer is an amazingly complex subject.  L'Avian's statement
vastly oversimplifies the subject by presupposing that ethoxyquin *is*
carcinogenic.  Nice of them to make that decision for you, no?  That famous
quote about wife beating also presupposes that the wife beating is already
fact, although it's worse in other respects...at least the L'Avian quote
isn't patronizing.
 
Taken to extremes, the attitude expressed by L'Avian would probably leave
you little choice but to starve to death since almost *everything* we
consume has some hazard associated with it, although for many things, the
risk is infinitisimally small.  Did you know that basil and black paper have
carcinogens in them?  Innocuous white mushrooms from the grocery store have
hydrazine (rocket fuel) in them?  And a fungus that infects grains that
produces a poison called aflatoxin which is a cumulative liver toxin that
causes liver cancer.  If you've eaten corn, peanuts, pistachios and many
other grains or nuts, you almost certainly have some aflatoxin damage in
your liver.  The risk of liver cancer goes up in alcoholics and those with
hepatitis B.  Oh, and chlorinated compounds in tap water have a low
carcinogenic potential, too.  In fact, several friends of mine are botanists
who tell me that most plants have toxins or other chemical means to keep
animals from eating them.
 
Following the line of thinking L'Avian uses, we should never eat another
peanut again, or corn, or basil, or water...because while it's not 100%
certain that it'll cause cancer in you, why take the chance?  Take a look at
a book at the library called the Merck Index (NOT the Merck "Manual").  It
lists virtually every chemical commonly used in food processing, drugs, and
many of those in industry.  The toxicity, carcinogenicity, teratogenicity
and all of those other "icities" are listed for each compound.  Virtually
everything in there is toxic to some degree or another.  But it's a matter
of *how* toxic and to whom (alcoholics, people with kidney failure, etc.)
 
"Why take the chance?" L'Avian asks.  What they're really asking is "Why
take *any* chance?"  And they don't have the right to ask you that.
EVERYTHING is a chance.  And wouldn't it be ironic if ethoxyquin keeps
aflatoxin from forming in stored food and prevents liver cancer?  We all
have the right to make informed choices about your chances, but I am
personally offended to have a company try to scare me into using their
product by making the risk for cancer so black and white and by keeping me
from making an informed choice.  I wonder if they mention in their
literature whether their suppliers of raw products use ethoxyquin or other
preservatives before L'Avian gets it?  I don't have any vested interest in
ethoxyquin, and I, too, worry about the possible risk ethoxyquin might pose.
But I'm also in infectious disease epidemiology and I worry about risk of
fungal or other contamination of improperly preserved food.  If a company
wants to educate me about why their product is better and why it has
expended more effort to provide me with a safer product I'll be happy to
hear them out and probably be more inclined to buy those products.  But
companies that use half-truths and fear-mongering don't deserve my
patronage.
 
   --Jeff (swimming-in-a-sea-of-environmental-carcinogens) Johnston
[Posted in FML issue 1657]