Friday, February 20th, 2015
Stephan: As if soft drinks were not already bad enough there now comes this, about the chemical used to make Coke, Dr. Pepper, and other drinks brown in color.
I confess I was amazed at how many people drink these beverages every day, sometimes several times a day. I am going to look and see what the health effect of these drinks is, compared to smoking tobacco. If you drink sodas, please stop.
Credit: Jeff Chiu/AP
Although former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s war against large sodas failed in court, it succeeded in spreading awareness about the danger of consuming too many sugary beverages. But we might have to be wary of sodas for reasons other than excess sugar and weight gain. A chemical called 4-methylimidazole (4-Mel), the additive that makes sodas like Coke and Dr. Pepper brown, is actually a potential carcinogen, and consuming enough of it puts you at an increased risk of developing cancers. (emphasis added)
Scientists at Consumer Reports and the Center for a Livable Future at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health recently
collaborated on a study which aimed to determine exactly how many Americans were at an increased risk of cancer due to 4-Mel consumption.
Consumer Reports wrote up the findings:
Among the more than half of Americans age 6 to 64 who drink soda on a typical day, it turns out that the average intake ranges from a […]