Arsenic in Your Rice
Consumer Reports recently released new research that found high levels of arsenic in rice as well as other rice products such as rice breakfast cereals, rice baby cereal and rice pasta. According to the International Agency for Research on Cancer, arsenic is a Group 1 carcinogen known to cause bladder, lung and skin cancer. Consumer Reports tested more than 200 samples of rice products — traditional and organic, notable brands and store bands — and found significant levels of arsenic levels in all of them.
Popular brands tested in the study included Goya, Uncle Ben’s, Gerber, General Mills, Kellogg’s and Quaker. The study found that consuming a single serving of rice could contain one and a half times more arsenic than drinking a day’s worth of water containing arsenic at 5 parts per billion — the Environmental Protection Agency’s originally proposed limit for arsenic in drinking water.
So how does arsenic get in rice? While the USA Rice Foundation is claiming arsenic is a “a naturally occurring element in soil and water,” Consumer Reportsstated that humans are mainly to blame. U.S. agricultural and industrial producers have used about 1.6 million tons of arsenic since 1910, making the United States the world’s leading arsenic user. We use arsenic for a variety ofpurposes, such as to treat lumber and to manufacture glass. Also, the practices we use to make more food faster and cheaper cause arsenic to contaminate rice. For example, arsenical pesticides and fertilizers linger in the soil, while animals are fed food-containing arsenic to make them plumper.
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