Chlormequat in food and urine from adults in the United States from 2017 to 2023

[JohnMakin]

You have to scroll an absurdly long time to find it but this is the key sentence:

> Current chlormequat concentrations in urine from this study and others suggest that individual sample donors were exposed to chlormequat at levels several orders of magnitude below the reference dose (RfD) published by the U.S. EPA (0.05 mg/kg bw/day) and the acceptable daily intake (ADI) value published by the European Food Safety Authority (0.04 mg/kg bw/day).

The levels reported in this study are so negligible but it gets a lot more clicks on your study if you present this data as "chlormequat was detectable in X% of samples." Statistically significant but they don't mention the concentration at all in the abstract, which is just as an important finding.

[Mistletoe]

>Toxicological studies suggest that exposure to chlormequat can reduce fertility and harm the developing fetus at doses lower than those used by regulatory agencies to set allowable daily intake levels.

I think they are worried about this. Perhaps the levels are set too high?

[suddenclarity]

> Compared to these previous studies in Europe, the median levels measured in our study of U.S. samples from 2017 to 2022 were lower, while the median level in 2023 samples were comparable to samples from Sweden, and lower than UK samples

> Current chlormequat concentrations in urine from this study and others suggest that individual sample donors were exposed to chlormequat at levels several orders of magnitude below the reference dose (RfD) published by the U.S. EPA (0.05 mg/kg bw/day) and the acceptable daily intake (ADI) value published by the European Food Safety Authority (0.04 mg/kg bw/day).

My two takeaways. The main source in the US seems to be from import and it's several magnitudes lower than acceptable daily intake. This might obviously change, but still reasonable to keep in mind.

[NegativeLatency]

Well this is making me think about switching to organic only grains. Feels like a bit of a regulatory failure.

[rtkwe]

The next hundred years is probably going to be grappling with how many toxic chemicals we allowed at 'safe' levels because it was inconvenient to industry to ban them the same way we're floored by the casual irradiation of the early 20th century.

[voakbasda]

Organic may not be much better, as many of the chemicals approved for organic crops are even worse. So, yes, regulation has failed. Good luck holding anyone accountable.

[tekla]

Neat, you get to have the fun organic chemicals inside you, the ones that are probably worse because they are "organic"

[DoneWithAllThat]

It’s not used on plants intended for human or animal consumption.

[vilicity]

I don't understand why it still seems to be a huge secret.They've genetically modified seeds so that home gardening of fruits and veggies seeds cannot be used to plant future gardens.They tell us that we're using to many antibiotics,yet antibiotics are given to cows,pigs,chickens,the very meats we consume.Maybe that's why antibiotics are being said to not work and not human consumption.The very living conditions of meat consumption is also tainted. Meats are being grown in labs stating a shortage of food yet they are using chemicals like the ones listed here to reduce the foods we need. They recently raised the retirement age to 70 years old. They are trying to use chemicals which cause infertility in humans (read the article here keyword infertile). It's all about controlling population, people not living to retire,yet using them as lab rats while they are on this side of the dirt.Plausable deniability be dammed .

[JanaKlein]

Has anyone tested cows & chickens? Dogs? General Mills owns Blue Buffalo. It looks like it's been in animal feed since 2007, and purebred dogs have had a noticeable fertility decline since about 2010. "Reverse Flynn effect" started 2011 (steadily decreasing IQs across the board in several countries) as did "trans" population explosion (in same countries.) Ppl think I'm crazy for thinking these issues are population control, so I'm happy to see I'm not alone.

[photochemsyn]

Body burning screening for toxic chemical accumulation should be a regular part of every American's yearly physical checkup with their doctor - which itself is an increasingly rare phenomenon, many people only go to doctors and hospitals after getting very sick as they can't afford to have a regular doctor or preventative health program. A body burden program would lead to the identification of the most problematic industrial and agricultural chemical products, and so it would be blocked by lobbyists from the fossil fuel, petrochemical, agribusiness, and manufacturing sectors.

America has the worst public health care / food safety system in the industrialized world, and not even a pandemic that killed over a million American citizens resulted in any political pressure to change the system.

[nonethewiser]

> Body burning screening for toxic chemical accumulation should be a regular part of every American's yearly physical checkup with their doctor

Is it just me or are yearly physicals and primary care doctors nearly worthless in practice (not in theory)? For adults, not kids.

Anything truly urgent is better served by urgent care or emergency room. They are useful for referrals for specialists when you actually have a serious issue. The screening you suggest seems like a good idea yet so far beyond the type of care they actually offer.

Its like they are the 1st tier tech support who cant really do anything and exist as a filter.

[boh]

Excuse me if I’m reading this wrong, but less than 100 urine samples were tracked for any given year?

[alwa]

On the one hand, as a statistician memorably put it, “doesn’t matter how big the soup bowl is, you still need the same size spoon to taste what kind of soup it is.”

On the other hand, yeah these particular convenience samples seem almost deliberately weird. The entire apparent spike in 2023 seems to correspond to a one-off total switch to buying random bulk urine from Florida.

[hscontinuity]

Having little personal knowledge in this area of food growth, harvest and production, then of course any pre-market execution practices for shelf lives or processing; what are the ill effects of exposure specifically relating to birth/fetal deficiencies?

Perhaps I'm a bad looker-up but I can't find the relative answer (seemingly) in various animal studies linked, outside of noting reproductive issues. Thanks in advance!

[throwitaway222]

Normally it's the US that is spraying plants with "Definitely Kills Humans TM" but this time I guess it was the EU doing it.

[vondur]

According the wikipedia page, Chormequat is not authorized for use in food crops, only ornamental plants. Has that changed?

[evancox100]

But as the article states, the EPA allows you to import food crops treated with Chlormequat. Don’t ask me how that makes any sense

[tfvlrue]

Treat this study with a grain of salt. The Environmental Working Group is essentially a lobbying group for the organic food industry. They tend to stigmatize "conventional" farming in pseudo-scientific ways to make organic food seem better or healthier, when the differences are typically just marketing.

More details:

https://www.agdaily.com/insights/dirty-deception-ewg-dirty-d...

https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4623/

[voakbasda]

Another reminder that most food produced by industrial processes is poisoning us. News of this chemical’s prevalence may be news, but the general story is not.

Yet nothing has changed, nor should anyone expect otherwise. Big Ag achieved regulatory capture and can afford to delay indefinitely (if not outright stop) any meaningful change from happening.

[readthenotes1]

I fail to understand why you're getting downloaded and I hope some of those who did will explain.

"Don't ask how the sausage is made" predates any of us still alive by a fair margin

[AlliedForces]

Can Chlormequat cause bladder cancer? I have it and eat Quaker Oats and Cheerios.