very pink. and one hundred percent natural of course. looks so tasty it has your mouth watering on the couch. with that's the point. but what if behind is pretty pink and one of the biggest health scandals of our era . in two thousand and fifteen the world health organization listed processed meats as carcinogenic for man. we decided to investigate the ingredients used by the giants of the food industry and d.n.a. breaks moved to eight cells into sort of precancerous cells. we discovered that to impede or halt regulations on certain additives food industry lobbies have been working in the shadows for decades. just to understand that the industry is of what he makes and is this so they're very risk averse they're not going to fund

a study that is bad for their business it's a simple model. it's just a baby so to speak political to get. at the heart of this strategy of influence are the scientists who collaborate this needs industry biju for this i reasoned some compensation for my time as well as the others call months. and i consent. and the scientists who are targeted. basically were trying to shoot me down or discredit me and that's what shoot down means scientifically. as for which go after the science to discredit the scientists is a key element of a much larger strategy has just gone mob the attire policy making process. between intimidation lies and manipulation we will uncover proof of a world. wide strategy where hitting below the belt is allowed.

feeling hungry now that it's time to eat tonight you are our guests. to find out how ham is made we visited a factory. we might. welcome to flowing one of the market leaders in france and one of the few to play the card of transparency. the ham on your supermarket shelves starts out like this. big lumps of pork meat. to add a taste a little vegetable stock. it all goes into a ham shaped mold and it's cooked. and the result perfectly pink rounded slices if you grasp the basics well let's rewind

a little to see the detail that changes everything. to obtain this fine there's another very important step. you have to inject the meat. a machine with a dozen syringes injects a liquid into the lumps of pork. the liquid contains an essential additive. factory manager who shows us. these yellow sacks contain a mixture of salt and sodium nitrite the additive to fifty. this is the day. you see. and in

a bid to move. the to be invalid. based on accepted me. in fact he's telling us that the pretty pink of our ham isn't natural at all. it's thanks to sodium nitrate. this additive fix is the pink of the meat during cooking. otherwise ham would be the color of roast pork. that's why food industrialist can't do without it as a processed meats producer would confirm. it's a loss since he says a lot or people are allowed. to get it on the toilet or that. it's not on just get it. all clear and clean jaunts of the normal green system for us. just different. city leaders there's only.

some come up to us i'm going to eat i'm not sure. that i can always. make it listen to. the ham natural but without the pink it would be impossible to sell. the big problem is that sodium nitrite is believed to be a danger to public health. the additives suspected of playing a role in the development of colorectal cancer. one of the deadliest cancers in europe. because of a phenomenon the takes place during digestion. it's chemistry but will make it simple. piece of cured meet. you think you're peacefully digesting

it but what you don't know is the nitrite molecules are reacting with the meat proteins transforming them into very dangerous substances. i mean. we went to the netherlands to learn more about the effects of this chemical reaction on our health. to the faculty of medicine of maastricht university. this is where the toxicologist professor teo the works. he's been interested in nitrites for years and by extension mattress a means. known to use damage in the last intestine so in. d.n.a. breaks. cells into sort of precancerous cells. or something. to prevent professor dick. notably want to find out what happens inside the body

when we don't eat processed meat and when we eat a lot of it to do so he conducted an experiment with human guinea pigs. for two weeks this student three hundred grams of processed meat a day the equivalent of eight. to fifteen we saw. the exposure to. considerably increased. threefold increase. levels that we measure. the researcher measured the impact on the organism of this chemical mutation of nitrites remains. in his lab he tested the water of big processed meat eaters. so what you see here is. four different individuals.

to see what happens inside the body the researchers mix this water with human cells . the white deposit in the test to. observe what happened to the cells. you see. everything is. but if you are exposed to. breakage it's all of the d.n.a. you see this. is. the more likely it is that this will eventually mutate into a type of cell how does it take for. relatively. say when we isolate the cells.

and they. also. stopped using nitrites. potentially. in europe. because. of very frequent disease. changes. thousands fewer and therefore potentially fewer deaths just by suppressing nitrites . but the food industry has a sledgehammer argument for justify the use of. it protects us from botulism.

botulism is a form of food poisoning caused by bacteria that affect our central nervous system and can be deadly. jerry right. but there's a glitch in their argument. they're already companies which do produce processed meats without nitrites and their customers are in fine form. if you happen to be copenhagen in denmark. pop into a supermarket. there you'll find cured meats nitrites. and for those whose danish is gone a bit rusty it's. it's everywhere.

you can usually recognize it by its color more brownish than pretty pink. the best known brand is produced one hundred fifty kilometers south of the capital in denmark biggest organic processed meat plant kind of god. and. the boss a biochemist started in nitrate free cured meats twenty five years ago. and since then the danish health authorities haven't registered a single case of botulism caused by processed meat. we do not have problems with this bacteria i would say for the last fifty years this has not been a recent. topic in western europe that was a problem and needed. hundred years ago where england of as clean as they

are slaughterhouses were another clean as they are today so no worry about bacteria now we have to worry about additives that my ticket was in. and if they are not necessary for some very good reasons we should not do is clear the cancer risk today didn't mean risks that's the main risk that they definitely and and they really it has been so. long to produce just in night meat the main reason is that the freight costs not accept which do not have the red color that they have been used to. so many in. the sort of situation as the concerns on the. parts of the four arab countries egypt saudi arabia emirates. as relates to policies of cut up about have to be

addressed to have had a very adverse impact on national security in the case of material evidence exists in the face of policies that have adversely impacted has created and has caused a loss of life in egypt this is an intolerable situation. and book it clearly will place call on a police a key to keep. the

usa i. was just. so. good in you know who was looking to commit their will and of my thick. enough life for the ball club with such force they didn't know when to dodge myself and why he said i feel we should i should think almost like yourself at all thank you. it was. one of the few food industry companies to do with rights. experts have been ringing alarm bells for years twenty five years ago a european union health report already recommended reducing the amount of nitrite used in processed meat. in one thousand nine hundred nine this report even put

forward banning its use altogether. despite the increasing number of studies the european commission still allows industrial food companies to add lots of nitrites to the products. so we went to the commissioner for health and food safety a former health minister in lithuania question. for our institutions. will follow. spencer did. for over an hour the commissioner attempted to pull the wool over our

eyes. in spite of all the reports by experts which for twenty five years have warned the authorities about the dangers of nitrites. you know oh. it's just. since the possibility. to do how do you move. this possible. this is. just sort of all decisions. this isn't like if i build big. union oh but i'm not kidding of european union i mean this story has been so going on for so long now known it started as it started shows that all stand in safety a line in this case is why europe lost against denmark in the european court of

justice in this story i don't know don says he's going. to go door to door to get more info to mention the us i am not one who knows evidence and. so let's look at the facts mr commissioner. denmark wanted to limit the use of nitrites the european commission was against it and in two thousand and three in court the danes won in the name of the protection of public health. i am very happy about european court jesters than european court. probably is but i want to do it that d.g. sunday and the commissioner to sponsor a problem is in better conditions and yet since this court ruling e.u. regulations are just as lax as ever. from my point of view we must be more and not

just asking to change the. need for follow ups to keep. on board popular counts just not profit absolutely but it's but it's of course it's. time perfect that's just what the food industry wants and what it is built its strategy on for years. because when it comes to nitrite industrialists have been waiting out the clock for forty eight. forty years of scientific manipulation blackmail and intense lobbying so the meat business can carry on bringing home the bacon. and it all began on the other side of the atlantic.

if you think we're exaggerating listen to this. in the late one nine hundred seventy s. nitrite was almost banned in the united states just after the publication of a large scale. study requested by the government. a relationship between. it was proved suggested proved and a fairly strong one there were two thousand. very extensive study done by a well respected scientist. nitrites was announced in the press but the american media institute would bring out its big guns. in his office overlooking the capital its president richard ling spoke. needs to contain or big big thing. about.

billion dollars about two thirds of the production in those days goes into cured meats and presents a problem or our industry and or the government. we're all hopeful of a solution. armed with financial analysis the american meat lobby forced the government to back down the banning of nitrites would send prices plummeting and cause an apocalypse. but it was a political event that would close the debate. in one thousand ronald reagan was elected president of the united states and guess who entered into government. richard ling the president of the american meat institute himself. the idea of banning nitrite forever bury.

the experiment base study on two thousand rats ended up in the trash can. and after that the same fate would await every scientific publication calling nitrites into question. if you're wondering how the interest of industry can systematically win against what's at stake in public health the following will enlighten you. fifteen years after the victory of reagan and the media industrialists a new study shook america to the core. if it's not one thing it's another a study finds a link between hot dogs now and cancer put yourself in the shoes of the average american joe at the time. you and your family are eating hot dogs at the shopping mall or in the street just as usual. the effect was immediate

in a matter of days dog sales fell by eight percent. and given the size of the american market that represented millions of dollars less for the food industry. the author of the hot dog study that caused sales to plummet was susan preston mark . she's now retired scientist living near los angeles in a residential suburban setting straight out of an american so. after several tense months of talks she agreed to see us. but we had to insist right up until the last minute. the lady is very discreet it's only to go from french.

mrs preston martin. yes i'm so i'm going to go some french t.v. . with your discoveries are processed meats the researcher was the victim of a number of attacks but she agreed to look back at her work. between the excessive eating of hot dogs and certain rare cancers in children. how did you find the relationship. well just the way we always did when we did case control studies we started out with a group of children who had leukemia and compared them to group children who didn't have leukemia and we asked the mothers about what they fed the children and sure enough the kids with. dogs what did you think when you saw this strong relationship because it was quite a she was with hot dogs i was a little bit surprised and just. reserved

judgment which is what. they find something they don't expect. from that moment on the food industrialists susan preston martin became public enemy number one. in the meat lobby they definitely didn't like what we were doing they were terribly upset and i could understand that you know their livelihood was making processed meat and they didn't want any any thing coming out saying that those were not good for you basically were trying to shoot me down or discredit me and that's what shoot down needs scientifically. what we discovered went much farther. the scientists had never realized just whom she was dealing with. america made a hot dog. meyer gave it to get it it is. in the us the

undisputed champion of supermarket sold hot dogs has always been oscar meyer. america's number one. a brand of the kraft foods group a giant of the food industry. so far no surprises. but what's less known is that at the time and until two thousand and seven kraft was owned by philip morris the world's second largest tobacco company a lobby which went as far as lies and manipulation to defend its own interests notably in the big tobacco lawsuits of the one nine hundred ninety s. they believe nicotine is not addictive i believe nicotine is not addictive yes i believe. cigarettes questioning proven scientific facts the strategy worked perfectly for years with tobacco so philip morris used it again to save oscar meyer's hot dogs. in kenya

in georgia stand how the multinational manipulated science to defend its investments in cured meats you know we headed to northern california. to san francisco. this university library holds what are commonly known as the tobacco documents millions of internal tobacco industry documents. and. our guide stanton glantz has spent his life unraveling the cigarette makers strategies. and. he particularly remembers one phrase used by a lobbyist in one thousand nine hundred sixty nine. doubters our product since it is the best means of competing with the body of fact that exists in the mind of the general public it is also the means of establishing

a controversy for him everything is summed up in one word. and it was exactly like that by creating doubt that philip morris set out to discredit dr preston martin study on processed meat and cancer in children. the proof is there in the vast database of the tobacco documents. by typing susan preston martin you get hundreds of hits. and all in the philip morris by. the researchers name crops up regularly in the titles of memos letters and internal reports. the multinational believed her study on hot dogs would reopen the debate surrounding nitrites from the one nine hundred seventy s. so it paid scientists to go through her work with

a fine tooth comb in order to find any weak points. even her contracts and grant papers passed under the microscope. basically anything that could be used against her. and we concur in the eyes of the government and the press. you can you know well you know it's really none of us i know but bring in one million people died and i. killed people even. now you know once to come to a way to chew everybody's round and that and that's. the

two thousand and eight economic crisis turn some countries into pigs these are the countries with weaker economies that needed austerity policies if you are in a situation no flow gloats even the recession austerity is a very bad idea it doesn't work and it makes millions of people very unhappy those who are unemployed see their wages decline almost a decade how good are the results she saw in those fifteen usually peaceful by the

people gathered in greece to watch the world get people to see what i. did beautiful view she was i mean to for legal. challenge must be more than this she did not was always think it she something and not. why are the same measures still in place one of the consequences is to weaken blue bird flu disputable the i will first. this is the truth the consider this is the consequences are actually quite acceptable to the decision making. here's what people have been saying about rejected in the sixties full on awesome well the only show i go out of my way to launch you know what it is that really packs

a punch oh yeah mr john oliver of r t america is doing the same we are apparently better than food nothing's better i see people you've never heard of love redacted tonight president of the world bank though they are going to write me seriously send us an email. our children are sick we're stranded here without say there is no fresh water anymore as civilians play us led coalition as strikes and mind still minutes away from the of occupancy of telephonic humanitarian groups warn people that face to face accept devastation and witness to may still. travel to the hometown of the mom who suspected of radicalizing the group of men who carried out the race this painted time. it's clear that they are understood to have attended prayers led by the tsotsi he's been accused.