* Interdepartmental Committee On Physical Deterioration * British Committee * Deemed the country unfit to defend itself the eve of the boar war * 38% of the men in Britain were physically unfit to fight * Due to poor diet * Working class boys in the beginning of the 20th century were on average 5 inches shorter than their private (known as public schools) counterparts * During WWII * Children had better teeth * Had a more robust sense of health * Left them in better shape than before the war * Processed meats are regarded as a threat to health * Linked to heart disease, cancer, etc. * Death rates were elevated by the amount of red meat consumed by the American Public * Deemed by the Harvard school of Health * 12% greater (not on exam!) * Each extra serving of red meat that you have a day * Is tied to a 16% increase of dying from a cardiovascular disease * Translates into a 10% increase of dying from cancer * Concluded that red meat is responsible for 1 in 10 deaths * Contamination in Food * Honey is the one food that doesn’t spoil * To some degree everyone suffers from food poisoning at some point * About 25% - 30% of Americans and Canadians will experience food poisoning each year * 76 million Americans get sick each year * 5,000 people a year die from some food born hazard * Center for disease control and prevention * On a daily basis, 200,000 get food poisoning * The Secret Life of Germs * Feels the rate is much higher; 800,000 suffer food poisoning each day * Everybody in the USA (and Canada) will have at least one incident of sickness this year related to food * Mycology is the science of mushrooms * First law of mycology * If you eat a mushroom and die, it was poisonous * When we eat we expose ourselves to several pathogens that can harm us * Jack-In-The-Box * In 1993 sold hamburgers tainted with ecoli * Large number of people getting sick, killing a few children * Maple Leaf Foods * Major outbreak in 2008 of lysteriousis * Ergot is a toxic condition that describes a fungus that infects certain grains * Can affect any grain; but is particularly prominent in rye * Grows when grains are improperly stored, gets too moist or gets wet * Affects both humans and animals * Research St. Anthony’s fire * Cause cramps, convulsions, miscarriages, gangrene, death * Can cause problems predictable on the basis of some of the active chemicals that are found in the fungus * Contains lysergic acid (LSD) * Creutzfedet-Jakod (CJ) * More commonly known as Mad Cow Disease * BSE * Appears in cattle and other animals that are fed cattle * Originated in the UK * Once you get it, it’s certain death * The Industrialized Supply Chain * The fewer producers of a product there are, the greater the risk of contamination * New Strains of Food-Borne Bacteria * 70% of all the agriculture commodity that gets traded on the planet is controlled by six companies * MSG, GMO, sweetners * Claims about these are generally overexaggerated * Far less important than other threats that are not stressed enough * Celiac * Produces symptoms that have been recognized since the 19th century * The cause of celiac was only understood in WW2 * Diagnosis as a disease only came about because of the war * William Dicke was the first to make the connection between diet and celiac disease * Been treating people with celiac but had no idea what the cause was, but had to deal with the symptoms * Aches, cramps, etc * During WW2, he had to deal with far fewer patients who had exhibited the symptoms of celiac * The war made it possible to make the connection between the diet the dutch were eating and the symptoms of the people he was treating * Found no new cases among all his patients * Something was missing from the American diet that was because of the war that “cured” the instances of celiac * In 1950, he made the connection that wheat was the cause * Is a controllable disease * Caused by an intolerance to a protein known as glutton * Fugu * Not served anywhere in Canada; only served in Japan * Chefs that can serve it have been trained and tested * 70% of the people who take the test fail * Has to remove a toxic sack from the fish without a rupture * If the tiniest rupture exists it will kill the consumer * Must know: * What month is it? * Is the chef the real thing? * Is he serious? * Is he precise?