have you noticed whenever you see a commercial for ham on t.v. it's often set in the countryside. with a nice family and a rustic backdrop. and the hem is always pink. 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 insurers d.n.a. breaks new date 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 does 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 as proof is there isn't just 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 so 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. efforts to

go after the science to discredit the scientists is a key element of much larger just the entire policy making process. between intimidation lies and manipulation we will uncover proof of a worldwide strategy for 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 fill one of the market leaders in france and one of the few to play the card of transparency. beckham on your supermarket shelves starts out like this. big lumps of pork meat.

to add 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. percent of the day. and. by two is enough to need a new bike i see going to be to be invalid nor include a house full of it that's up to 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 me during cooking. otherwise ham would be the color of roast pork. that's why food industrialist can't do without it as a processed meat producer would confirm. it's of a loss since he says a lot. to get

a lot of that or that we. see on just get it. all cleared and clean jaunts of the normal greed. system for. sick illegals that is only. going to. some come up to some benefit. that i can always. let some up. natural but without the paint 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. its chemistry but will make it simple. piece of cured meet. you think your 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 cook works. he's been interested in nitrites for years and by extension natural some means.

known to use damage in the last intestine so a. d.n.a. breaks mutates cells into sort of precancerous cells. or something. to prevent professor to cook notably wanted to find out what happens. 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. of happens. 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.

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 . deposited 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 then. and. also. stop using nitrites then what. would make a difference potentially. in europe. that's huge that's huge because. of very frequent disease. changes. thousands fewer cancers 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. ferry 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 in copenhagen in denmark. pop into

a supermarket like we did. there you'll find cured meats nitrites. and for those whose danish is gone a bit rusty it's. it's everywhere. you can easily recognize it by its color more brownish than pretty pink. and 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 of all the last fifty years this has not been the recent. topic in western europe that was a problem and needed to stay under years ago when the thing going up 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. and if they are not necessary for some very good reasons we should not do is clear the cancer risk today i mean risks that's the main risk today definitely and and agony it has been so. long to produce just in need but main reason is that freight costs not accept which do not have the red color of the they have been used to. so many.

how does it feel to be a sheriff the greatest job in the world it's as close to being a king as any job there is one business model helps to run a prison now we just do it oh my guess is nobody oh visitation i don't know one comes in even more we don't have to sarge and many more is cost effective that's what they want to do that loan they don't give a damn if. there are actually paying us to put them back into the louisiana incarceration rate is twice as high as the us sam bridge what she could is behind such success.

seemed wrong. why don't we all just don't all. get to shape out just to become educated and gain from it equals betrayal. when something find themselves worlds apart we choose to look for common ground. see that's not a fully is one up at the bottom of it it's not a study can you do you know. about the chemical many that don't even see that young . people and bodies that a lot of bodies. want

to go as one of the few food industry companies to do without nitrites. and he had 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 all together. despite the increasing number of studies the european commission still allows industrial food companies to add lots of nitrites to the products. so we want to add to the commissioner for health and food safety a former health minister in lithuania question.

levels lower i. got on key you would think it is it is of course you can use all falls for our institutions which are their disappearance a boat will follow for safety and to present was fired no it is no it's all respects takes. time and i'm. just very sad that. for over an hour the commissioner attempted to pull the wool over our eyes. in spite of all the reports by. words which for twenty five years have warned the authorities about the dangers of nitrite. all these studies you don't think they're enough you know all so starved is that it's just your blood sent to transparency since the possibility to have them to show. that she had to do it to follow and to see and to do how to move fully. as soon as possible since parents is good this is better than just sort of did all decisions in the lines of procedures.

like this isn't like if i build big. union oh but i'm not giving up european union i mean this is. going on for so now and i started to say it started as it started shows that all stand in safety in this case why europe lost against denmark in the european court of justice in this story i don't know very calm down says it's going to be. told or do we need 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. and i am very happy about

european court decisions than european court all these shows are public but i wanted it to mean is that. the commissioner to sponsor a public is in better conditions and yet since this court ruling the new regulations are just as lax as ever you know from my point of view we must be. asking to change the form. for. us to keep. on board popular counts just not put off it. but. 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. 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 rats involved in the study it's

a very extensive study done by a well respected scientist. the banning of 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 out. needs to contain or big big thing. well when they have billion. about two thirds of the production in the states goes into cured meats. presents a problem or are in the story and or the government. we're all hopeful that a solution. armed with financial analysis the american meat lobby forced the government to back down the banning of nitrites would send poor prices plummeting and cause an apocalypse. but it was

a political event that would close the debate. in one nine hundred eighty 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 was forever buried. the experiment based 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 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 a 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 time to go from french t.v. . mrs preston martin. yes i'm so i'm going to go some strange t.v. . with her discoveries on processed meats the researcher was the victim of a number of attacks but she agreed to look back at her work which showed a link between the excessive beating 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 the game 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 strong she was with hot dogs i was a little bit surprised and just. reserve judgment which is what epidemiologists do and they find something they don't expect . from that moment on where the food industrialists susan preston martin became public enemy number one. and 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 meats and they didn't want any anything 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 further. the scientists had never realized just whom she was dealing with. america made the hot dog. meyer gave it to get a big hit. in the u.s. 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. do you believe nicotine is not addictive i believe nicotine is not addictive yet i believe. cigarettes questioning proven scientific facts the strategy worked perfectly for years with tobacco so philip morris use it again to save oscar meyer's hotdogs. and 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. and. doubters our product since that 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 balance database of the tobacco documents. by typing susan preston martin you get hundreds of hits. and all in the philip

morris supply. the researchers named 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. america is committing brand suicide because the things that america is going to

stand for are being dragged through the mud by rachel maddow and other folks at m.s.n. basic and other media outlets that are reporting gossip anyone doubts nonsense and report the news. when i hope it will. give me no it's this sunday i'm not to run then shal you got to sit in bed. by the spirit over some just. yeah us on the shelf approach you sometimes not want something to go much part of the a lot of the behind of the out. on the she does the ground she did the militia recovery

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