July 23, 2026 • 52 mins
From formula to pureed carrots, baby food is a massive -- and necessary -- industry. Each year millions upon millions of families search for the best, most nutritious food to feed their children, and there's no shortage of advice from experts and parents alike. However, it appears there's a secret to this industry: Numerous baby food products contain ingredients parents can't see on the label, including contaminants like mercury, lead, arsenic and more. How long has this been occurring? What did the manufacturers know, and when? Tune in to learn more.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, This would is for the baby conspiracy realist
in the crowd. Welcome to planet Earth. Hope it still
has that new car smell. Hope you're at a honeymoon period.
Sorry about all the terrible stuff that happened before you
were bored, but we hope you like baby food.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Oh man, you know it's there's certain flavors of baby
food that I think are yummy even to grown kidding.
I just always liked the problem, you know, when there
was like a kind of a porridge kind of thing.
I enjoyed even that when I was a kid.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Gogurt is baby food marketed to adults.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Gogurt slaps and things like cream of wheat. But you know,
we've talked often on the pod about a time before
you know, very rigorous standards regarding packaging and then some
of the you know, aspirin poisoning, you know, epidemics and
various instances of product tampering. Who is more vulnerable in
(00:56):
that regard than you know, the humans, the tiny humans
that can see baby.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
Food and the adult parents that are attempting to get
whatever the healthiest thing is they can afford for their child, right,
And those are two different things the thing they can
afford and the healthiest thing, and you try and find
the medium the median in there somewhere. Guys. There, this
is twenty twenty one when we talked about this. I'm
looking at a CBS News article from March of this year,
(01:23):
twenty twenty six, saying some baby formula brands contain lead, arsenic,
and other heavy metals according to consumer reports. It's not
like this is something that's gone away that we covered
back then, you.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Know, yeah, because we found that numerous baby food products,
especially in the United States, contain ingredients that are not
only bad for the kiddos, but are things that you
will not see on the label, stuff like mercury, lead, arsenic,
et cetera, et cetera at all. So in twenty twenty one,
(01:56):
we asked how long has this been occurring, what did
the manufactures know exactly, and when did they learn that?
Is there a conspiracy afoot?
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, guys, I know I led with this idea of
tampering with baby food. We're talking about stuff not even
requiring tampering. We're talking about stuff that ends up in
there unbeknownst to the consumer from the companies themselves, who
are supposed to be you know, legitimate and looking after
their end consumer, which would be in this case, babies.
But there have been examples of folks purposefully contaminating baby
(02:27):
food as well.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
But that's not exactly the throw of this episode.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Do you guys remember if this one covers baby formula
as well or this is just like the jar baby
food kind of stuff. I just can't remember if we
because I know, baby formula is a whole other bag
of badgers. Hopefully we talked about a little bit in
this one, but remember when we looked back at that, guys,
I can't remember we've done a full episode.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Oh, baby formula.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
It has always been a bit controversial, I mean there,
you know. I mean, obviously a lot of mothers, new
mothers would prefer to be able to breast but because
there are sometimes extenuating circumstances that make that difficult or impossible,
I know that typically formula is considered, you know, the
second choice, and there are reasons for that, not necessarily contamination,
(03:13):
but even just how it can affect the health of
a growing child versus breastfeeding.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And we do indeed talk about infant formula in this episode,
and as as we had pointed out here, folks, there
is a hard and disturbing argument that the situation hasn't
changed or hasn't improved that much over these past five years.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Well and look up Abbott Labs. That's happening right now
with bacterial contamination in baby formula. It's crazy.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
And let's roll the tape.
Speaker 4 (03:48):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Our compatriot Noel is on adventures, but will be returning.
They called me Ben. We're joined as always with our
super producer. All mission control decands, most importantly, you are you,
You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know. Now, Matt, I don't.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
Often say this.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Because I don't want to be alarmist, but today's episode
is something that everyone needs to pay close attention to.
This is an ongoing situation. This is a serious situation,
and it's one, frankly, that we could use your help with.
We meaning not just Matt and Paul and myself but everyone,
(05:00):
especially parents with young children. Let's start with something wholesome.
You will be glad we did, I can assure you so, Matt,
you remember the Gerber Baby.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
I do remember the Gerber Baby. I've recently seen the
Gerber baby as of several years ago, when I was
taking their products and putting them into my son.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Yes. Yeah, the Gerber Baby is probably one of the
most famous babies in modern history, and like the Marlborough
Man of old, the Gerber Baby is actually several different
babies since nineteen twenty eight or so, the companies used
(05:41):
this adorable face of this tyke to sell their products
to parents around the US and the world. The interesting fact,
for a long time, the identity of the actual baby
was a secret until the late seventies, but as the
years went on, the company began holding these wildly popular
contests to choose the next Gerber Baby. So there are
(06:06):
probably people in the crowd today who were contestants in that,
you know, without their consent, of course, was their parents
or people who have said, hey, my baby's cute. Maybe
my baby is Gerber Baby cute. In some ways, it's
like this American tradition now, and it's probably going to
stand the test of time, But not for the reason
(06:27):
you might think it's going to stand the test of time,
because nowadays Gerber is a subsidiary of another much much
larger company.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, one that we've talked about before. For us, it
was in the context of water, which they're very much
known for, and there's also a lot of water in
Gerber products, But that doesn't mean that why we're talking
about them. The company you'll remember is Nestley, known.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
For their chocolate, the activities they engage in to get
that chocolate from a bean state to your local grocery store.
Known of course for bottled water, and their extensive work
in that regard. We've covered these, as Matt said in
previous episodes, but did you know, conspiracy realists that Nesley
(07:18):
is also this country's largest purveyor of babyfood, just the
umbrella term baby food. That's where our story begins. It's
a story that we have all been characters in. Whether
our part in the story started when we were four
to six months of age, when babies typically begin eating
solid food, or whether our story starts later in life
(07:40):
when we were parents, babysitters, elder siblings, or guardians. This
industry at some point in some way affects every single
person on the planet. So let's talk about it. Let's
dive in. Here are the facts.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Baby food, Yeah, baby food. A lot of times the
first food is milk from your mother. If you're a mammal,
that's generally how the story goes. But for a myriad
of reasons, that's not always in the cards for everyone.
So there are things like baby products, baby formula, baby food,
and like Ben said, around four to six months, that
(08:19):
food starts to change. And my goodness, we were all
babies and we all need food, and it is a
difficult thing to make baby food for your own child
on a daily, weekly, monthly basis. So that and that
means there's a lot of baby food, and it means
that it's a large market essentially, lots of people trying
(08:40):
to buy different baby food, which means it's a huge
competitive industry, lots of companies trying to buy for that
market share. And retail sales in the baby food segment
were about seventy one point four billion US dollars in
twenty eighteen. Wow, And it's expected that in three years
(09:03):
that number seventy one point four billion dollars will jump
to ninety eight point nine billion dollars, and that jump
is a whole bunch of reasons, everything from inflation to
the number of people actually eating the baby food. There's
a bunch of stuff that goes into that projection. But
it is going to grow, and.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
We're getting some of these from STATISTICA. So those numbers
you just heard are us. But this projection, this projection
has a lot of different factors that can come into play.
I love that you pointed that out, Matt. We're not
just talking about projected berths. We're also talking about parts
(09:45):
of the world where people have rising income. So people
who are traditionally having to make baby food at home
can maybe now spend a little bit more of that
extra income at the grocery store buying these products in
In twenty nineteen, China officially became the largest single market
for baby food. India comes in second place. The US
(10:08):
ranks sixth one. Incredibly depressing US baby food fact I
found because as you know, I'm not conventionally reading about
baby food. Baby food, dude, it is one of the
most frequently shoplifted items in the entirety of the US.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
That is a.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Statement that is true and has an anthology of heartbreaking
stories behind it. You know, it reminds me of that
old short story that's so often attributed unprovably to Hemingway
for sale baby shoes never worn.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Oh yeah, anyway, you got it right, And it's not
always shoplifting. Many times it's oh wow, this kid grew
a lot faster than we expected. My son went, I
think he had. He's had two pairs of shoes now
that we bought for him. He tried them on, wore
them for about a week, and then it was over
and he couldn't wear them anymore. And that's just how
it goes. But yeah, you're right. There are a lot
(11:08):
of reasons why, through circumstance, you may have to turn
to getting food for your baby, or you know something
that you need for your baby and you just can't
afford it. It's terrible.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Necessity is one of the greatest motivators for the breaking
of social norms, right or the breaking of laws. So
let's look at the players in the baby food industry
right now. If you look at baby food in general,
and you include infant formula, which can replace the mother's
(11:43):
milk that you have mentioned Matt. You'll see that this
market is largely dominated by three outfits. Nessley, a group
called Breckett Benkiser also known as Mead Johnson, and another
one that I wasn't too familiar with. I don't know
if you had heard of the Matt Dnone, Danone.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
No, I know Danon, I don't know da n n E.
Not sure about them. But yeah, together those three firms
control forty five percent of the global market share when
it comes to this stuff. That's that's a lot of
control for three companies.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Oh also fact check fact check Live, which we usually
don't have to do. It's a French company. It's pronounced
oh so so sorry about that for anybody who is
going to hear the conspiracy we're unraveling, and their primary
objection would be the mispronunciation. There if that's what we
(12:39):
got in front of that, Yeah, think about that. They
control almost half of the global market share. There are
other players in the game, of course, but these are
the titans of this industry. Ingredients regulations, all right, let's
say it. Baby food I just always assumed was not
(12:59):
considered particularly appetizing to many adults or many kids for
that matter. I was somewhat incorrect in that assumption. I
found that there there's a a whole wealth of literature
of recipes that use baby food as ingredients for adults,
(13:20):
and there's some adults.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
Like baby food.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Either way, it's not going to hurt you if you
eat it as an adult. It does play this vital
role in childhood development. Like you were saying, Matt, and
I remember you know, when your son was even younger,
you were like, this kid is growing so fast. I'm like, oh,
that's wholesome and heartwarm, mean, and you're like, no, dude,
I have to buy clothes and stuff.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Yeah, it's like right right now, he's out of clothes
essentially because he's outgrown them over the past couple of months.
And my goodness it is. It's not cheap, you guys.
Thank goodness for places. Oh I'm in a blank on
the name.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Now.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Kid to kid I think is what it's called. Places
like that where it's hand me down clothes that because
all these parents, everyone, you are probably in the same
situation out there where you just you need to get
rid of these clothes. You need to get new clothes.
You can trade them. Kid to kid not sponsored by them,
but they're great. It is so true, and this baby
food is highly important, as you said, for the for
(14:23):
the nutrition of these children. And I'm gonna have to
point out some of the newer baby foods, at least
newer to me since I become a parent, are actually
pretty good. It's essentially like a fruit and vegetable smoothie,
but it's more of a puree than a you know,
a juice or something. And it's actually pretty tasty because
(14:44):
it's just you know, you're getting actual strawberries in there.
It's not so bad. At least it doesn't taste immediately
so bad.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Yeah, there we go. I mean, kids, human kids grow
at a break deck and need a steady supply of
nutritious food. This is not a hot take. The multiple
a multitude of studies show that a lack of proper nutrition,
even in one specific area or another, can have these
(15:16):
damaging permanent effects on people throughout the rest of their lives.
Malnutrition is a great example, like if you look at
certain generations of people born in South Korea and people
born in the DPRK, you'll notice that there is an observable,
statistically consistent difference in height because residents of the DPRK
(15:41):
the vast majority for a time where lavery under food
and security. So everybody knows this is true. Everybody knows.
This is not the part that's a hot take. These
are just the facts, folks. In the US, there's an
outfit called the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.
They're responsible for the regulation of infant formula, specifically amit,
(16:01):
a number of other things. So we have people with
eyes on this, and even the most extreme opponents of
big government in the audience, even the most extreme of
libertarians can see the value inherent in having some sort
of authority keeping eye on food manufacturers here. So this
should be the opposite of a hot button or controversial issue.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
Right, Yeah, of course, why would there be any problems here?
I mean, right, there is a problem, and it's a
problem that's been around for a while, and we're going
to tell you exactly what it is and how bad
it is. Right after a word from our sponsor.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
Here's where it gets crazy.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
So contamination baby food.
Speaker 4 (16:54):
It's a real thing.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
It's not some alarmist opinion whatever. There was a landmark
congressional study just released earlier this month. As Matt and
I record this on February fourth, twenty twenty one, Congress
found that despite the existence of some regulations, literal tons
(17:17):
and tons and tons of baby food products are contaminated
such that you probably want to think twice before you
give them to your children. This wasn't an isolated incident, folks.
This was not like Company A, some factory for Company
A had a bad day, or got some crap carrots
(17:38):
and used them anyway, or some apple cherry puree. I
don't even know if that's a thing, Matt. But instead
this study, they found that a wealth of baby food
products are contaminated with something called toxic heavy metals inorganic arsenic, lead, cadmium,
(17:58):
and mercury in particular.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
And these aren't the only toxic heavy metals that historically
have been found in foods, especially in baby foods, but
these four are the ones that are focused on in
this congressional study, and the four metals they're bad, you guys.
All four are considered by the WHO to be the
(18:24):
top in the top ten chemicals of concern when it
comes to children, infants, and younger younger children. All of
them have been linked to things like cancer, chronic diseases.
Of all sorts, neurotoxic effects, learning disabilities, all kinds of
things and their detrimental effects are way worse for developing brains,
(18:47):
for young brains as compared to adults, and you know,
grown grown folk such as us. It's I am again
in this episode. We're going to make a little bit
light of some of this in order to get through it.
But this is very, very serious, and we're gonna take
it seriously.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Yeah, I mean consider, I know, as soon as a
lot of us heard that the L word, as soon
as a lot of us heard led and babyfood, were
thinking of the longitudinal studies linking crime to early lead
exposure right often through pipes, I mean, water systems and
so on. But yeah, it gets worse, It gets much
(19:31):
much worse. According to Representative Rajah Krishna Morti, who is
the chairman of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy,
the congressional investigation that the subcommittee conducted quote revealed that
manufacturers knowingly sell, not sold knowingly sell tainted baby food
(19:51):
to unsuspecting parents in spite of internal company test results
showing high levels of these toxic metals without any warning
labels right, which from a pure profit motive makes sense.
You're a parent, you're going to you have to buy
some kind of baby food. You pick up two items
(20:13):
next to each other on the shelf. You'll flip them around,
look at the ingredients, and one of them has a
warning that says may contain lead. Which one are you
going to go for?
Speaker 3 (20:22):
You know, yeah, or you know may contain lead, arsenic, cadmium,
and other terrible things like mercury. Yeah, you're not gonna
buy that. And there we're gonna we're gonna break this
stuff down even further in their reasons why there are
no labels on there, and there are also reasons why
that the testing that is done by these companies is flawed. Uh,
(20:43):
But for now, what it does mean is that the
manufacturers of a lot of these baby foods were aware
that these substances were in their products, and they still
let let them get purchased, and they still manufactured them,
and they just kept going because that they knew that
there were potential dangers. And it doesn't mean that these
(21:05):
at least right now. If you're a parent listening to
this and you probably just fed your child something from
beech Nut or Gerber or whoever it was, it doesn't
mean your baby is immediately in peril because of this.
It doesn't mean your child is at risk right now,
in this moment because you've fed them one thing of
baby food. But it does mean feeding them over time
(21:27):
could be a real risk. And the companies that sold
it to you knew.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Nikes and kept doing it, not just in the US,
but around the world. They're explicitly aware of the potential
dangers here. So according to a guy named doctor Leonardo Tressande,
who is a professor of pediatrics at the NYU Grossman
School of Medicine also the director of the Center for
(21:53):
the Investigation of Environmental Hazards over at NYU. According to
this doctor, critics have been raising concerns about the possibility
of this contamination for years. This is not breaking news
to the public. I mean it definitely wasn't breaking news
to the companies. In twenty seventeen, there was a nonprofit
(22:14):
organization still around called Clean Label Project, and they release
findings from a study they had commissioned that showed the
same thing we're talking about today. I think they focused
specifically on arsenic lead and mercury and their findings and
they found these again in the leading brand, brand name
products for infant formula and baby food. And then there
(22:37):
was another study that came out just last year. Wait, nope,
two years ago, now twenty twenty one. This came out
in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Yes, yeah, study from Healthy Babies Bright Futures came out
in October of twenty nineteen. They took it a step
further from the twenty seventeen study. They looked at one
hundred and sixty eight baby foods. They were looking for
the same stuff Arsenic led Mercury Academium, and they found
some terrible things. And right now, if you go online
(23:05):
and search I think how I found it was toxic
baby food twenty nineteen, that's a good way to find it.
Or just look up that organization, Healthy Baby's Bright Futures,
you can find what we're about to tell you. They
found ninety five percent of all of these foods that
they tested contained at least one of the heavy metals,
(23:26):
and one in four of the baby foods contained all four.
So a quarter of that one hundred and sixty eight
different types of baby food contained all four heavy metals.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, and amid these metals, lead was the worst offender.
So we know a lot about how lead can affect
developing human minds. Ninety four percent of the baby foods
tested contained some degree of lead. Cadmium, and arsenic followed.
They were in about three quarters around three quarters of
(24:01):
all the baby food tested. And you always thinking that
maybe there's a way for manufacturers to spin things that
contain I don't think you could get away with this
with lead, too many people know about it.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
But what if you.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Change the label to now with ten percent more cadmium.
Cadmium sounds just enough like calcium that people would be fooled.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
If you used a selective font, you can probably get
away with it.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Yeah, make it papylous, make it something classy. Right, So,
mercury was the least common of these. Mercury was in
less than a little less than one third of the
food tested, so comparatively, I guess that's not so bad.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
This is dark.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
But you can find like one other thing they found
that is useful for any parent listening today is that
some foods were more likely to have this stuff. And
we'll also explain why later in today's episode.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
Yeah, well, we'll talk about rice in particular, which is
something that tends to have more arsenic, so rice based
cereals and snacks were particularly high in this stuff. In juices, dude,
there have been so many studies over the years about juices,
and it's for the same things we're going to talk
about today, the same processes that these heavy metals get
(25:27):
into these products. We're going to tell you about that.
But juices, Good lord, Cranberry juice, you guys, was my
absolute all time favorite thing for so many years, and
now I'm just thinking twice. I feel like my IQ
has been reduced several points, at least according to some
of the studies, because of the amount of cranberry juice
(25:49):
I have taken into my body.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Well wait, wait, doctors recommend cranberry juice for people with
kidney problems.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
Yeah, well, and guess where heavy metals go your kidneys.
I'm just choking. Oh god, I'm just joking. I'm kind
of joking about that part. But I really did drink
a lot of cranberry juice. Another thing, are like tubers,
especially sweet potatoes, things that grow in the ground, root vegetables, carras,
et cetera. They can be especially dangerous as well.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Yeah, which has got to be a surprise for a
lot of us, because rice snacks are often sold as
a healthy alternative right to various things. And of course
they're all over I almost said the cereal community. They're
all over the big cereal brands, you know, because rice
is an inexpensive food stuff and it can be very nutritious.
(26:43):
So four of the seven rice cereals that are specifically
for infants that this study tested contained inorganic arsenic, and
that's the more toxic form of this metal. The levels
of our arsenic, of this type of arsenic that we're
in there, exceeded the FDA's proposed limit of one hundred
(27:06):
parts per billion. So the FDA for this arsenic for
this case does have a proposed limit, which is, hey, guys,
like you're talking to loud kids at a dorm, Hey guys,
keep your arsenic levels down to one hundred parts per billion.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
We're going to talk about the FDA and baby foods, right, Okay, yeah, yeah, good.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Only there is a little bit of light the tunnel,
but it's faint and it's distant. Of the one hundred
and sixty eight baby foods tested, some were found not
to contain traces of any of these four metals. Exactly,
nine baby foods of one hundred and sixty eight were
found to be clean. So these studies are in large
(27:55):
part what prompted this congressional investigation. And in the course
of this investigation, the Congress has seven of the largest
baby food producers in the US to give their own
internal documents and their own test results because naturally, you know,
part of being a food company and selling to the
public means that you have to have internal testing. There
(28:17):
are safety standards of some sort you have to meet.
Here's the thing, though, Matt. Four companies replied to the request, Nurture, Beechnut, Haine,
and Gerber, but a couple of companies just didn't do it.
Imagine that, like, what level are you at when Congress
(28:38):
ask you for something and you go, eh, well.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
You're at Walmart level right, Specifically Sure, which is one
of the companies that did not respond. Also Campbell, like
Campbell Soup, they produce quite a bit of baby food,
as well as Sprout Organic Foods, which I have to
say is one of the biggest brands that my family
(29:00):
chose to feed our sun, which troubles me greatly, But
that's okay, that's Okay, so, yeah, they didn't respond. They
didn't they didn't give the investigators anything, and it made them,
you know, the people who are looking into this quote
greatly concerned.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
Yeah, and that's that is a verbatim quote, but it
doesn't quite nail the reaction that people would be having.
Speaker 3 (29:28):
Right.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
So, several of the companies we should note to be
fair I have released public statements in response to this
or have responded to members of the media asking them
about it. You can read those statements online. They are
pretty much exactly what you expect, which is the gist
is we test rigorously for any materials or anything that
(29:53):
can't legally be included in this stuff. Or the way
it'll sometimes be phraised is we rigidly adhere to all federal.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
Guidelines, yeah, or FDA standards or something like that. And
one of the major things you'll read in these statements
is that they test each product as it comes in.
So one of the major things we're going to continue
on here is that they test the carrot when it
comes in and gets ready for the manufacturing process. They
(30:23):
test the apple, they test you know, the individual foods.
The big question though, is are they actually testing the
end product and where are those numbers, because that's what
this investigation was, looking at the actual product.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
And the containers too. Yeah, that's how they would That's
some of the metrics the studies use are some of
the language. So specific. Examples of this kind of stuff include,
of course, beechnut gerber that's a bummer, Plum Organics, parents' choice,
many many, many, many more. And I know these names
are familiar to a lot of folks listening to the
(31:01):
show today, and maybe to my co host.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Dude, I know the plumb Organics one too, Dude. As
a parent, like you're trying to you're trying to give
your kid the best stuff, no matter who you are,
no matter where you are, you want to give your
kid the best stuff you can afford. And you know
the best foods. You have access to the healthiest things.
And I swear to you, man, a lot of these
foods market themselves, and they market themselves as being healthy.
(31:28):
They convince you as a parent that you're doing the
right thing. And I'm not saying that you're doing the
wrong thing by feeding your kids these things. It's just
a it feels like a real betrayal, knowing that they knew.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Right right, And of course none of this is medical advice.
We're just we're giving you the lay of the lay
of this disturbing land. So how about this, We should
point out that they're doubtlessly other products out there containing
these poisons. This is the beginning of what may end
(32:04):
up being an even larger list. We're going to pause
for a word from our sponsor and will return to
talk a little bit about how we as a society
got here, the potential health effects, and what if anything
you can do as an individual or your communities can
do as a group to combat this problem.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
We're back.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
The danger here is not theoretical. The danger here is proven.
It is clear these substances can cause harm to a
baby's developing brain and nervous system, both while they're in
utero and after birth. Impacts can include things like the
(32:55):
permanent loss of intellectual capacity, and they've also been linked
to things like ADHD or autism. All four of these
antagonists in the story are linked to IQ loss from
exposures early in life. The evidence is here, there's hard
science behind it. The science behind it spans decades. The
(33:17):
research is ongoing, and it keeps proving the same stuff
there were at least twenty three studies published in the
last seven or eight years that confirm the impact specifically
of these toxic heavy metals on the healthy development of children.
These studies are available. These studies are things that manufacturers
(33:39):
of baby food would have been well aware of at
the time, at least in part. It appears, according to
congress because their own internal testing confirmed it.
Speaker 3 (33:50):
Yeah, So let's now jump to the FDA and like,
what do they say, what are the safe levels of
some of these heavy metals? Are there any safe levels?
What is that look like? How do you measure that
kind of stuff? Well, in order to get a handle
on this, we are forced to look at drinking water
statistics and FDA FDA guidelines and a couple like EPA
(34:14):
guidelines for drinking water. So, according to this Congressional report,
and according to the Food and Drug Administration, the FDA
has a limit allowable level of some of this stuff
in bottled water. So when you're talking about when you're
talking about arsenic, it's ten parts per billion of this
inorganic arsenic, this particular type of the metal. When you're
(34:37):
talking about lead, it's capped at five parts per billion.
As the allowable amount and cadmium five parts per billion, okay,
so really low ten five and five parts per billion
to be safe in drinking water. The EPA, when it
looks at this, has capped the allowable level of mercury
(34:58):
in drinking water at two parts per billion. Again almost nothing,
almost zero. But then we got to look at the
test results of these baby foods and it is pretty
astounding the levels that were found.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
Right, the test results for baby food and their ingredients,
back to your earlier point, Matt, Congress says, they eclipse
those levels. There are results that are up to ninety
one times the allowable level of arsenic again embottled water,
up to one hundred and seventy seven times the level
(35:38):
of lead, sixty nine times nice the level of cadmium,
and up to five times the level of mercury. And again,
remember we said mercury is the one that seems to
occur the least often. So why are we using bottled water?
Why why did Matt, why did you say we're forced
to use the standards for bottled water.
Speaker 3 (36:00):
Well, that's because there are no FDA standards for these
heavy metals in baby food. They don't they don't exist.
There are no standards for them.
Speaker 1 (36:10):
That's wild.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Why because their babies?
Speaker 1 (36:14):
Sorry sorry Noye the FDA.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
Yeah, it's just it feels like insanity. I don't understand.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
Yeah, it's unacceptable. And and you know, we want to
be clear when we're talking about institutions doing this kind
of stuff. We're not saying, uh, you working for the
FDA or your friend working for the FDA is somehow
inherently a bad person. These are things that happen collectively
with institutions. There. Maybe there were some lobbyists putting their
(36:50):
thumb on the scale. I would not at this point
be in the least surprised. Maybe there was just an
overwhelming amount of paperwork. But the end result is that
kids are literally eating lead and catiumin or a snake
in mercury. So that is where we are now. There
(37:14):
are some proposed limits, but the FDA doesn't have these
hard limits in That's why we had to compare it
to bottled water. What is to be done? Well, As
we said at the top, this does not have an
easy answer. There's not one particular institution that can correct it.
If the FDA came back today and said these levels
(37:38):
have to be this, then manufacturers would of course be
legally bound to scramble to meet those constraints. But look,
it's so easy to make someone the bad guy. It's
not as if these manufacturers are like sitting around on
their coffee break from their Illuminati meeting or their Bohemian
(38:01):
grove meeting and saying, you know what would be fine, Yeah,
would be like a real kick for all of us.
Since we're out of adrenochrome, why don't we just start
adding stuff to baby food. They didn't think about it
like that. They didn't scheme to purposefully put dangerous substances
in your children's food. That food comes from somewhere else.
(38:23):
It doesn't come from those factories, right, It comes from
the soil, and that food grows in the soil using
nutrients and using water. When the land and the water
and the air are contaminated, then we are already starting
out at a fundamental disadvantage in the supply chain. Even
if you're a billion dollar company. Right now, there are
(38:46):
only so many places in the world where you can
get certain crops. It's true. That's just a reality. It's
not a hot take. So these substances are also all
elements that are occurring in the wild now because they've
been frequently used in pesticides for like the last century
or so, and they didn't ever go away. They're still
(39:07):
in the soil, they're still in the groundwater, even if
they stopped being used in pesticides decades ago. That doesn't mean,
that doesn't mean the the missteps of the past were
somehow negated and the bill bill in short comes due.
Speaker 3 (39:25):
Yeah, that's very true. And there's also a lot of
these particularly lead that were just pumped out into the
air through automobiles for a long time. When you're thinking
about diesel and the lead that was contained in there,
lead paint, all kinds of lead products that just ended
up in the environment. There are a lot of reasons
that the soil itself, as you said, ben is going
(39:48):
to be contaminated, because the air was contaminated, because the
water was contaminated at some point, because X was contaminated
at some point and continues to be polluted and contaminated,
and it's it's it is a very tough situation. Knowing that,
knowing that I think it's around one percent of the
Earth's land area is actually able to be or to
(40:11):
be used for producing crops. It's a very small amount
of the earth that humanity can actually use to grow
its food. And you know, what are you going to
do when you can't use it? Let alone the whole
Was it the phosphorus? Yeah's the phosphorus thing where we're
running out. It really is on my mind.
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Dude, to take us in maybe a slightly less hopefully
less depressing tangent. Did you know that phosphorus is being
considered as one of the markers of possible life on
other planets or intelligent life like in the search in
the search for stuff, we've been the human species has
(40:55):
been looking for evidence of water, evidence of other thing
like carbon, et cetera. But phosphorus may end up being
the key. It's more important than a lot of people think.
Speaker 3 (41:06):
And don't don't let them fool you, Ben, They're just
looking for phosphorus so we can take it and bring
it back here because we need it.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
Phosphorus heist down, I would be I would crew on
that mission. According to the World Bank, the percentage of
arable land the well percentage of the world's total land
area that could be considered agricultural. It's pretty high. It's
thirty seven point seven percent, But the part that can
be considered arable land, which is what I think we're
(41:35):
really talking about, is only ten point six percent, and
that umber that number may decrease over time.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Well a little better than one percent. So thank goodness, well,
thank goodness for like.
Speaker 1 (41:47):
All right, but okay, so here's another question. If the
FDA has not set those minimal levels. It's a messed
up question, but it's on our show has to ask
are these manufacturers breaking the law in their conspiracy to
put profits over the health of children. It is a
conspiracy totally, but is it an a legal conspiracy at
(42:12):
this point?
Speaker 3 (42:14):
That's tough. I'll have them talk to my attorneys. Wait,
I'll have to hire some attorneys. But yeah, I don't
want to get sued by these guys, you know, by
Big Baby. No, please not that.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
So there are advocates who believe that there's a strong
legal case here. About a week after that report published
earlier this February, a law firm got involved. Their name
is balm hedlund Eristi and Goldman, and they have started
accepting lawsuitcases about toxic baby food for parents who purchase
(42:51):
food from any of those brands and have children who
have been diagnosed with autism or ADHD attention deficit hyperd
activity disorder. But again, but again, none of that cleanses
the ecosystem of these contaminants. And from what we understand
(43:12):
of the current science, nobody really knows how to one
hundred percent get the genie back in the bottle here,
or if there is a way, it's still largely theoretical,
and multiple institutions are unwilling to bear the cost of
the attempt itself. So the current hope right now, amidst
(43:35):
the nonprofit groups, the concerned parents, the politicians, everybody, is
that the findings of these and other studies might spur
manufacturers to do more testing and to change their practices
as much as possible to get these levels down. But
then we have to ask, We have to ask about
(43:55):
the other folks in the crowd, the other folks who
are affected by this supply chain, the parents, Like, what
if you are listening to this episode and this is
the first time you're learning about this, your first question
is what the hell do I do?
Speaker 2 (44:14):
Now?
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (44:15):
Yeah, what the hell do I do? And in order
to discuss that, you have to talk about a few things.
The first one is that it appears because of how
these heavy metals function. We are talking about a cumulative
effect when it comes to these things, and it's not
(44:36):
a you get dosed one time by eating, you know,
a particular baby food that has some arsenic in it,
and then now your child has issues. The problem is
it's cumulative. So I've been watching way too much daytime
TV where they've had experts on talking about this. Ben,
I've been watching so much. Do you remember that show
(44:57):
that Doctors? They really Yeah, they did a fairly good
job actually by having numerous experts on and getting some
competing opinions here. But the takeaway from all of them together,
I would say is that pediatricians say that you just
need to if you are feeding your child baby food,
(45:17):
you need to just limit the number of these things
they're eating and supplement it with really fresh fruits generally,
it's what they're saying, and grains not rice. That is
just the first thing. I'm just going to put that
out there. That's what I have heard, and that your
child is not, you know, in danger just for eating
(45:39):
you know, one pouch or whatever that has some of
these metals in.
Speaker 1 (45:43):
It, right, right, This is not a death sentence. This
is there's an accumulative aggregate effect at play with exposured
almost any substance.
Speaker 3 (45:52):
But it does make it there's a trust issue then
that I have, at least personally when it comes to
this stuff, because as a parent, it feels like my trust,
like the trust between me and these baby food manufacturers
has been broken. Then it's making me question, you know,
the advice I'm getting from daytime TV experts who are
being paid to go on television and you know who
(46:16):
a lot of times are sponsored by these big companies.
So it's tough to know. It's really tough to know.
The good thing is that there are all kinds of
resources out there online that you can check out. You
can educate yourself, and you can make the best decisions,
you know, at least for that you can for you
(46:36):
and your family.
Speaker 1 (46:37):
Yeah. Yeah, And some of the nonprofits we mentioned earlier
have have advice as well on how to combat the
rate of heavy metal consumption by exactly as you described, Matt,
finding safer alternatives to baby foods that may be on
these lists or found to contain these substances, you know,
(47:00):
oatmeal instead of rice, cereal, or barley, et cetera. Maybe
frozen bananas to replace teething cookies or biscuits. However, as
any current or expecting parent knows, the world is full
of advice for you. The cup of unsolicited parenting advice
(47:20):
runneth over, you know, like, and these sources of advice
are not created equally. Don't be fooled. I mean you
don't don't assume that everybody's automatically a bad actor. But
don't let someone's opinion or persuasive writing fool you into
thinking what you are reading is automatically factual. It stinks
(47:43):
right now that the burden of research is on people
who have often just entered the busiest time of their
adult lives and are trying to like sleep occasionally. It
stinks that part of that part of that burden falls
on you as a parent, to do the digging, do
the research. To not be afraid of writing directly to
(48:08):
companies with questions if you don't feel like you're getting
satisfactory answers searching online. I guarantee you these companies have
people whose entire job, their full time job, is to
field and answer these questions, so they will be there
and then even if you find a blog that you
(48:28):
really like, look for the science, look for the boring stuff,
look for the numbers, look for the studies. That congressional
report is available freely online. The studies that we mentioned
are also freely available online. This stuff is not you know,
this is not a secret military program. Hopefully this stuff
should all be declassified and for public consumption. And now
(48:51):
we arrive at your part of the story, fellow conspiracy realists.
As Matt and I said at the top, we need
your help. How do you think this contamination can or
should be addressed? Do these companies owe any kind of
compensation to the children and the parents involved? I mean,
how would that even work? That's a huge question. And
(49:14):
perhaps most importantly, do you have a personal story or
experience you would like to share with us or your
fellow listeners. If so, please let us know. We try
to be easy to find online.
Speaker 3 (49:27):
Yeah, that's right. You can find us on Facebook and Twitter,
where you are a conspiracy Stuff Conspiracy Stuff show. On Instagram,
you can check out Here's where it Gets Crazy. That
is our group on Facebook with by the way, some
of the best mods on the planet, coolest human beings
you will ever meet. Hopefully you won't cross them and
(49:48):
have to meet them that way, you'll meet them in
a happy way. And here's where it gets crazy. If
you don't like using social media, well, hey, you can
find us via phone.
Speaker 1 (50:01):
Yes, that's right, Matt. We have a phone number one
eight three three st d wytk cal. You'll hear, you'll
hear a voicemail message. You'll have three minutes. Those three
minutes belong to you. We can't wait to hear from you.
We have some tips for you that will help you
(50:21):
help you get around some of the weirdness of speaking
into the void for three minutes. First, go ahead and
open with your name or your nickname and let us
know whether or not you are okay with your voice
and name being used on air or your nickname. Second,
tell us what's going on, give us the scoop, give
(50:42):
us the skinny, hip us, hip us to the story.
And then third, if there's anything you want to just
say to us, then leave that for the end. If
it's something you just want Matt, Nole, Alexis or Paul
or me to know. And then fourth, last thing most important,
if there's a really long story that's on your mind,
(51:05):
go ahead and write to us at our email address.
We'll give you that email address. We made some pretty
good progress I think, going through our voicemail queue, and you.
Speaker 3 (51:17):
Talk about you did Ben, you did that, dude, We
thank you.
Speaker 1 (51:21):
We did it. And Matt had to be a one
man army for a very long time. So we instituted
something that without any hint of irony or pretension. We
were calling operations scorched earth, voicemail.
Speaker 3 (51:36):
Scorched mail.
Speaker 1 (51:38):
That was better. We should have That's what we should
have gotten with. But so we can't wait to hear
from you. But if you do not feel comfortable with
the social needs, if you don't really dig using the phone,
totally get it. That's why we are always here for you.
There's one easy way you can always contact us. That's
(51:59):
our good fashioned email address.
Speaker 3 (52:01):
Where we are conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff they
(52:24):
don't want you to know is a production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
All right, This would is for the baby conspiracy realist
in the crowd. Welcome to planet Earth. Hope it still
has that new car smell. Hope you're at a honeymoon period.
Sorry about all the terrible stuff that happened before you
were bored, but we hope you like baby food.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Oh man, you know it's there's certain flavors of baby
food that I think are yummy even to grown kidding.
I just always liked the problem, you know, when there
was like a kind of a porridge kind of thing.
I enjoyed even that when I was a kid.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Gogurt is baby food marketed to adults.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Gogurt slaps and things like cream of wheat. But you know,
we've talked often on the pod about a time before
you know, very rigorous standards regarding packaging and then some
of the you know, aspirin poisoning, you know, epidemics and
various instances of product tampering. Who is more vulnerable in
(00:56):
that regard than you know, the humans, the tiny humans
that can see baby.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
Food and the adult parents that are attempting to get
whatever the healthiest thing is they can afford for their child, right,
And those are two different things the thing they can
afford and the healthiest thing, and you try and find
the medium the median in there somewhere. Guys. There, this
is twenty twenty one when we talked about this. I'm
looking at a CBS News article from March of this year,
(01:23):
twenty twenty six, saying some baby formula brands contain lead, arsenic,
and other heavy metals according to consumer reports. It's not
like this is something that's gone away that we covered
back then, you.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
Know, yeah, because we found that numerous baby food products,
especially in the United States, contain ingredients that are not
only bad for the kiddos, but are things that you
will not see on the label, stuff like mercury, lead, arsenic,
et cetera, et cetera at all. So in twenty twenty one,
(01:56):
we asked how long has this been occurring, what did
the manufactures know exactly, and when did they learn that?
Is there a conspiracy afoot?
Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, guys, I know I led with this idea of
tampering with baby food. We're talking about stuff not even
requiring tampering. We're talking about stuff that ends up in
there unbeknownst to the consumer from the companies themselves, who
are supposed to be you know, legitimate and looking after
their end consumer, which would be in this case, babies.
But there have been examples of folks purposefully contaminating baby
(02:27):
food as well.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
But that's not exactly the throw of this episode.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Do you guys remember if this one covers baby formula
as well or this is just like the jar baby
food kind of stuff. I just can't remember if we
because I know, baby formula is a whole other bag
of badgers. Hopefully we talked about a little bit in
this one, but remember when we looked back at that, guys,
I can't remember we've done a full episode.
Speaker 1 (02:51):
Oh, baby formula.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
It has always been a bit controversial, I mean there,
you know. I mean, obviously a lot of mothers, new
mothers would prefer to be able to breast but because
there are sometimes extenuating circumstances that make that difficult or impossible,
I know that typically formula is considered, you know, the
second choice, and there are reasons for that, not necessarily contamination,
(03:13):
but even just how it can affect the health of
a growing child versus breastfeeding.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And we do indeed talk about infant formula in this episode,
and as as we had pointed out here, folks, there
is a hard and disturbing argument that the situation hasn't
changed or hasn't improved that much over these past five years.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Well and look up Abbott Labs. That's happening right now
with bacterial contamination in baby formula. It's crazy.
Speaker 1 (03:44):
And let's roll the tape.
Speaker 4 (03:48):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Our compatriot Noel is on adventures, but will be returning.
They called me Ben. We're joined as always with our
super producer. All mission control decands, most importantly, you are you,
You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know. Now, Matt, I don't.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
Often say this.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Because I don't want to be alarmist, but today's episode
is something that everyone needs to pay close attention to.
This is an ongoing situation. This is a serious situation,
and it's one, frankly, that we could use your help with.
We meaning not just Matt and Paul and myself but everyone,
(05:00):
especially parents with young children. Let's start with something wholesome.
You will be glad we did, I can assure you so, Matt,
you remember the Gerber Baby.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
I do remember the Gerber Baby. I've recently seen the
Gerber baby as of several years ago, when I was
taking their products and putting them into my son.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Yes. Yeah, the Gerber Baby is probably one of the
most famous babies in modern history, and like the Marlborough
Man of old, the Gerber Baby is actually several different
babies since nineteen twenty eight or so, the companies used
(05:41):
this adorable face of this tyke to sell their products
to parents around the US and the world. The interesting fact,
for a long time, the identity of the actual baby
was a secret until the late seventies, but as the
years went on, the company began holding these wildly popular
contests to choose the next Gerber Baby. So there are
(06:06):
probably people in the crowd today who were contestants in that,
you know, without their consent, of course, was their parents
or people who have said, hey, my baby's cute. Maybe
my baby is Gerber Baby cute. In some ways, it's
like this American tradition now, and it's probably going to
stand the test of time, But not for the reason
(06:27):
you might think it's going to stand the test of time,
because nowadays Gerber is a subsidiary of another much much
larger company.
Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, one that we've talked about before. For us, it
was in the context of water, which they're very much
known for, and there's also a lot of water in
Gerber products, But that doesn't mean that why we're talking
about them. The company you'll remember is Nestley, known.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
For their chocolate, the activities they engage in to get
that chocolate from a bean state to your local grocery store.
Known of course for bottled water, and their extensive work
in that regard. We've covered these, as Matt said in
previous episodes, but did you know, conspiracy realists that Nesley
(07:18):
is also this country's largest purveyor of babyfood, just the
umbrella term baby food. That's where our story begins. It's
a story that we have all been characters in. Whether
our part in the story started when we were four
to six months of age, when babies typically begin eating
solid food, or whether our story starts later in life
(07:40):
when we were parents, babysitters, elder siblings, or guardians. This
industry at some point in some way affects every single
person on the planet. So let's talk about it. Let's
dive in. Here are the facts.
Speaker 3 (07:57):
Baby food, Yeah, baby food. A lot of times the
first food is milk from your mother. If you're a mammal,
that's generally how the story goes. But for a myriad
of reasons, that's not always in the cards for everyone.
So there are things like baby products, baby formula, baby food,
and like Ben said, around four to six months, that
(08:19):
food starts to change. And my goodness, we were all
babies and we all need food, and it is a
difficult thing to make baby food for your own child
on a daily, weekly, monthly basis. So that and that
means there's a lot of baby food, and it means
that it's a large market essentially, lots of people trying
(08:40):
to buy different baby food, which means it's a huge
competitive industry, lots of companies trying to buy for that
market share. And retail sales in the baby food segment
were about seventy one point four billion US dollars in
twenty eighteen. Wow, And it's expected that in three years
(09:03):
that number seventy one point four billion dollars will jump
to ninety eight point nine billion dollars, and that jump
is a whole bunch of reasons, everything from inflation to
the number of people actually eating the baby food. There's
a bunch of stuff that goes into that projection. But
it is going to grow, and.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
We're getting some of these from STATISTICA. So those numbers
you just heard are us. But this projection, this projection
has a lot of different factors that can come into play.
I love that you pointed that out, Matt. We're not
just talking about projected berths. We're also talking about parts
(09:45):
of the world where people have rising income. So people
who are traditionally having to make baby food at home
can maybe now spend a little bit more of that
extra income at the grocery store buying these products in
In twenty nineteen, China officially became the largest single market
for baby food. India comes in second place. The US
(10:08):
ranks sixth one. Incredibly depressing US baby food fact I
found because as you know, I'm not conventionally reading about
baby food. Baby food, dude, it is one of the
most frequently shoplifted items in the entirety of the US.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
That is a.
Speaker 1 (10:29):
Statement that is true and has an anthology of heartbreaking
stories behind it. You know, it reminds me of that
old short story that's so often attributed unprovably to Hemingway
for sale baby shoes never worn.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Oh yeah, anyway, you got it right, And it's not
always shoplifting. Many times it's oh wow, this kid grew
a lot faster than we expected. My son went, I
think he had. He's had two pairs of shoes now
that we bought for him. He tried them on, wore
them for about a week, and then it was over
and he couldn't wear them anymore. And that's just how
it goes. But yeah, you're right. There are a lot
(11:08):
of reasons why, through circumstance, you may have to turn
to getting food for your baby, or you know something
that you need for your baby and you just can't
afford it. It's terrible.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Necessity is one of the greatest motivators for the breaking
of social norms, right or the breaking of laws. So
let's look at the players in the baby food industry
right now. If you look at baby food in general,
and you include infant formula, which can replace the mother's
(11:43):
milk that you have mentioned Matt. You'll see that this
market is largely dominated by three outfits. Nessley, a group
called Breckett Benkiser also known as Mead Johnson, and another
one that I wasn't too familiar with. I don't know
if you had heard of the Matt Dnone, Danone.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
No, I know Danon, I don't know da n n E.
Not sure about them. But yeah, together those three firms
control forty five percent of the global market share when
it comes to this stuff. That's that's a lot of
control for three companies.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Oh also fact check fact check Live, which we usually
don't have to do. It's a French company. It's pronounced
oh so so sorry about that for anybody who is
going to hear the conspiracy we're unraveling, and their primary
objection would be the mispronunciation. There if that's what we
(12:39):
got in front of that, Yeah, think about that. They
control almost half of the global market share. There are
other players in the game, of course, but these are
the titans of this industry. Ingredients regulations, all right, let's
say it. Baby food I just always assumed was not
(12:59):
considered particularly appetizing to many adults or many kids for
that matter. I was somewhat incorrect in that assumption. I
found that there there's a a whole wealth of literature
of recipes that use baby food as ingredients for adults,
(13:20):
and there's some adults.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
Like baby food.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Either way, it's not going to hurt you if you
eat it as an adult. It does play this vital
role in childhood development. Like you were saying, Matt, and
I remember you know, when your son was even younger,
you were like, this kid is growing so fast. I'm like, oh,
that's wholesome and heartwarm, mean, and you're like, no, dude,
I have to buy clothes and stuff.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Yeah, it's like right right now, he's out of clothes
essentially because he's outgrown them over the past couple of months.
And my goodness it is. It's not cheap, you guys.
Thank goodness for places. Oh I'm in a blank on
the name.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Now.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Kid to kid I think is what it's called. Places
like that where it's hand me down clothes that because
all these parents, everyone, you are probably in the same
situation out there where you just you need to get
rid of these clothes. You need to get new clothes.
You can trade them. Kid to kid not sponsored by them,
but they're great. It is so true, and this baby
food is highly important, as you said, for the for
(14:23):
the nutrition of these children. And I'm gonna have to
point out some of the newer baby foods, at least
newer to me since I become a parent, are actually
pretty good. It's essentially like a fruit and vegetable smoothie,
but it's more of a puree than a you know,
a juice or something. And it's actually pretty tasty because
(14:44):
it's just you know, you're getting actual strawberries in there.
It's not so bad. At least it doesn't taste immediately
so bad.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Yeah, there we go. I mean, kids, human kids grow
at a break deck and need a steady supply of
nutritious food. This is not a hot take. The multiple
a multitude of studies show that a lack of proper nutrition,
even in one specific area or another, can have these
(15:16):
damaging permanent effects on people throughout the rest of their lives.
Malnutrition is a great example, like if you look at
certain generations of people born in South Korea and people
born in the DPRK, you'll notice that there is an observable,
statistically consistent difference in height because residents of the DPRK
(15:41):
the vast majority for a time where lavery under food
and security. So everybody knows this is true. Everybody knows.
This is not the part that's a hot take. These
are just the facts, folks. In the US, there's an
outfit called the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.
They're responsible for the regulation of infant formula, specifically amit,
(16:01):
a number of other things. So we have people with
eyes on this, and even the most extreme opponents of
big government in the audience, even the most extreme of
libertarians can see the value inherent in having some sort
of authority keeping eye on food manufacturers here. So this
should be the opposite of a hot button or controversial issue.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
Right, Yeah, of course, why would there be any problems here?
I mean, right, there is a problem, and it's a
problem that's been around for a while, and we're going
to tell you exactly what it is and how bad
it is. Right after a word from our sponsor.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
Here's where it gets crazy.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
So contamination baby food.
Speaker 4 (16:54):
It's a real thing.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
It's not some alarmist opinion whatever. There was a landmark
congressional study just released earlier this month. As Matt and
I record this on February fourth, twenty twenty one, Congress
found that despite the existence of some regulations, literal tons
(17:17):
and tons and tons of baby food products are contaminated
such that you probably want to think twice before you
give them to your children. This wasn't an isolated incident, folks.
This was not like Company A, some factory for Company
A had a bad day, or got some crap carrots
(17:38):
and used them anyway, or some apple cherry puree. I
don't even know if that's a thing, Matt. But instead
this study, they found that a wealth of baby food
products are contaminated with something called toxic heavy metals inorganic arsenic, lead, cadmium,
(17:58):
and mercury in particular.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
And these aren't the only toxic heavy metals that historically
have been found in foods, especially in baby foods, but
these four are the ones that are focused on in
this congressional study, and the four metals they're bad, you guys.
All four are considered by the WHO to be the
(18:24):
top in the top ten chemicals of concern when it
comes to children, infants, and younger younger children. All of
them have been linked to things like cancer, chronic diseases.
Of all sorts, neurotoxic effects, learning disabilities, all kinds of
things and their detrimental effects are way worse for developing brains,
(18:47):
for young brains as compared to adults, and you know,
grown grown folk such as us. It's I am again
in this episode. We're going to make a little bit
light of some of this in order to get through it.
But this is very, very serious, and we're gonna take
it seriously.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Yeah, I mean consider, I know, as soon as a
lot of us heard that the L word, as soon
as a lot of us heard led and babyfood, were
thinking of the longitudinal studies linking crime to early lead
exposure right often through pipes, I mean, water systems and
so on. But yeah, it gets worse, It gets much
(19:31):
much worse. According to Representative Rajah Krishna Morti, who is
the chairman of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy,
the congressional investigation that the subcommittee conducted quote revealed that
manufacturers knowingly sell, not sold knowingly sell tainted baby food
(19:51):
to unsuspecting parents in spite of internal company test results
showing high levels of these toxic metals without any warning
labels right, which from a pure profit motive makes sense.
You're a parent, you're going to you have to buy
some kind of baby food. You pick up two items
(20:13):
next to each other on the shelf. You'll flip them around,
look at the ingredients, and one of them has a
warning that says may contain lead. Which one are you
going to go for?
Speaker 3 (20:22):
You know, yeah, or you know may contain lead, arsenic, cadmium,
and other terrible things like mercury. Yeah, you're not gonna
buy that. And there we're gonna we're gonna break this
stuff down even further in their reasons why there are
no labels on there, and there are also reasons why
that the testing that is done by these companies is flawed. Uh,
(20:43):
But for now, what it does mean is that the
manufacturers of a lot of these baby foods were aware
that these substances were in their products, and they still
let let them get purchased, and they still manufactured them,
and they just kept going because that they knew that
there were potential dangers. And it doesn't mean that these
(21:05):
at least right now. If you're a parent listening to
this and you probably just fed your child something from
beech Nut or Gerber or whoever it was, it doesn't
mean your baby is immediately in peril because of this.
It doesn't mean your child is at risk right now,
in this moment because you've fed them one thing of
baby food. But it does mean feeding them over time
(21:27):
could be a real risk. And the companies that sold
it to you knew.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Nikes and kept doing it, not just in the US,
but around the world. They're explicitly aware of the potential
dangers here. So according to a guy named doctor Leonardo Tressande,
who is a professor of pediatrics at the NYU Grossman
School of Medicine also the director of the Center for
(21:53):
the Investigation of Environmental Hazards over at NYU. According to
this doctor, critics have been raising concerns about the possibility
of this contamination for years. This is not breaking news
to the public. I mean it definitely wasn't breaking news
to the companies. In twenty seventeen, there was a nonprofit
(22:14):
organization still around called Clean Label Project, and they release
findings from a study they had commissioned that showed the
same thing we're talking about today. I think they focused
specifically on arsenic lead and mercury and their findings and
they found these again in the leading brand, brand name
products for infant formula and baby food. And then there
(22:37):
was another study that came out just last year. Wait, nope,
two years ago, now twenty twenty one. This came out
in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
Yes, yeah, study from Healthy Babies Bright Futures came out
in October of twenty nineteen. They took it a step
further from the twenty seventeen study. They looked at one
hundred and sixty eight baby foods. They were looking for
the same stuff Arsenic led Mercury Academium, and they found
some terrible things. And right now, if you go online
(23:05):
and search I think how I found it was toxic
baby food twenty nineteen, that's a good way to find it.
Or just look up that organization, Healthy Baby's Bright Futures,
you can find what we're about to tell you. They
found ninety five percent of all of these foods that
they tested contained at least one of the heavy metals,
(23:26):
and one in four of the baby foods contained all four.
So a quarter of that one hundred and sixty eight
different types of baby food contained all four heavy metals.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, and amid these metals, lead was the worst offender.
So we know a lot about how lead can affect
developing human minds. Ninety four percent of the baby foods
tested contained some degree of lead. Cadmium, and arsenic followed.
They were in about three quarters around three quarters of
(24:01):
all the baby food tested. And you always thinking that
maybe there's a way for manufacturers to spin things that
contain I don't think you could get away with this
with lead, too many people know about it.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
But what if you.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Change the label to now with ten percent more cadmium.
Cadmium sounds just enough like calcium that people would be fooled.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
If you used a selective font, you can probably get
away with it.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Yeah, make it papylous, make it something classy. Right, So,
mercury was the least common of these. Mercury was in
less than a little less than one third of the
food tested, so comparatively, I guess that's not so bad.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
This is dark.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
But you can find like one other thing they found
that is useful for any parent listening today is that
some foods were more likely to have this stuff. And
we'll also explain why later in today's episode.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
Yeah, well, we'll talk about rice in particular, which is
something that tends to have more arsenic, so rice based
cereals and snacks were particularly high in this stuff. In juices, dude,
there have been so many studies over the years about juices,
and it's for the same things we're going to talk
about today, the same processes that these heavy metals get
(25:27):
into these products. We're going to tell you about that.
But juices, Good lord, Cranberry juice, you guys, was my
absolute all time favorite thing for so many years, and
now I'm just thinking twice. I feel like my IQ
has been reduced several points, at least according to some
of the studies, because of the amount of cranberry juice
(25:49):
I have taken into my body.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
Well wait, wait, doctors recommend cranberry juice for people with
kidney problems.
Speaker 3 (25:56):
Yeah, well, and guess where heavy metals go your kidneys.
I'm just choking. Oh god, I'm just joking. I'm kind
of joking about that part. But I really did drink
a lot of cranberry juice. Another thing, are like tubers,
especially sweet potatoes, things that grow in the ground, root vegetables, carras,
et cetera. They can be especially dangerous as well.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Yeah, which has got to be a surprise for a
lot of us, because rice snacks are often sold as
a healthy alternative right to various things. And of course
they're all over I almost said the cereal community. They're
all over the big cereal brands, you know, because rice
is an inexpensive food stuff and it can be very nutritious.
(26:43):
So four of the seven rice cereals that are specifically
for infants that this study tested contained inorganic arsenic, and
that's the more toxic form of this metal. The levels
of our arsenic, of this type of arsenic that we're
in there, exceeded the FDA's proposed limit of one hundred
(27:06):
parts per billion. So the FDA for this arsenic for
this case does have a proposed limit, which is, hey, guys,
like you're talking to loud kids at a dorm, Hey guys,
keep your arsenic levels down to one hundred parts per billion.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
We're going to talk about the FDA and baby foods, right, Okay, yeah, yeah, good.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Only there is a little bit of light the tunnel,
but it's faint and it's distant. Of the one hundred
and sixty eight baby foods tested, some were found not
to contain traces of any of these four metals. Exactly,
nine baby foods of one hundred and sixty eight were
found to be clean. So these studies are in large
(27:55):
part what prompted this congressional investigation. And in the course
of this investigation, the Congress has seven of the largest
baby food producers in the US to give their own
internal documents and their own test results because naturally, you know,
part of being a food company and selling to the
public means that you have to have internal testing. There
(28:17):
are safety standards of some sort you have to meet.
Here's the thing, though, Matt. Four companies replied to the request, Nurture, Beechnut, Haine,
and Gerber, but a couple of companies just didn't do it.
Imagine that, like, what level are you at when Congress
(28:38):
ask you for something and you go, eh, well.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
You're at Walmart level right, Specifically Sure, which is one
of the companies that did not respond. Also Campbell, like
Campbell Soup, they produce quite a bit of baby food,
as well as Sprout Organic Foods, which I have to
say is one of the biggest brands that my family
(29:00):
chose to feed our sun, which troubles me greatly, But
that's okay, that's Okay, so, yeah, they didn't respond. They
didn't they didn't give the investigators anything, and it made them,
you know, the people who are looking into this quote
greatly concerned.
Speaker 1 (29:20):
Yeah, and that's that is a verbatim quote, but it
doesn't quite nail the reaction that people would be having.
Speaker 3 (29:28):
Right.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
So, several of the companies we should note to be
fair I have released public statements in response to this
or have responded to members of the media asking them
about it. You can read those statements online. They are
pretty much exactly what you expect, which is the gist
is we test rigorously for any materials or anything that
(29:53):
can't legally be included in this stuff. Or the way
it'll sometimes be phraised is we rigidly adhere to all federal.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
Guidelines, yeah, or FDA standards or something like that. And
one of the major things you'll read in these statements
is that they test each product as it comes in.
So one of the major things we're going to continue
on here is that they test the carrot when it
comes in and gets ready for the manufacturing process. They
(30:23):
test the apple, they test you know, the individual foods.
The big question though, is are they actually testing the
end product and where are those numbers, because that's what
this investigation was, looking at the actual product.
Speaker 1 (30:38):
And the containers too. Yeah, that's how they would That's
some of the metrics the studies use are some of
the language. So specific. Examples of this kind of stuff include,
of course, beechnut gerber that's a bummer, Plum Organics, parents' choice,
many many, many, many more. And I know these names
are familiar to a lot of folks listening to the
(31:01):
show today, and maybe to my co host.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Dude, I know the plumb Organics one too, Dude. As
a parent, like you're trying to you're trying to give
your kid the best stuff, no matter who you are,
no matter where you are, you want to give your
kid the best stuff you can afford. And you know
the best foods. You have access to the healthiest things.
And I swear to you, man, a lot of these
foods market themselves, and they market themselves as being healthy.
(31:28):
They convince you as a parent that you're doing the
right thing. And I'm not saying that you're doing the
wrong thing by feeding your kids these things. It's just
a it feels like a real betrayal, knowing that they knew.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Right right, And of course none of this is medical advice.
We're just we're giving you the lay of the lay
of this disturbing land. So how about this, We should
point out that they're doubtlessly other products out there containing
these poisons. This is the beginning of what may end
(32:04):
up being an even larger list. We're going to pause
for a word from our sponsor and will return to
talk a little bit about how we as a society
got here, the potential health effects, and what if anything
you can do as an individual or your communities can
do as a group to combat this problem.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
We're back.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
The danger here is not theoretical. The danger here is proven.
It is clear these substances can cause harm to a
baby's developing brain and nervous system, both while they're in
utero and after birth. Impacts can include things like the
(32:55):
permanent loss of intellectual capacity, and they've also been linked
to things like ADHD or autism. All four of these
antagonists in the story are linked to IQ loss from
exposures early in life. The evidence is here, there's hard
science behind it. The science behind it spans decades. The
(33:17):
research is ongoing, and it keeps proving the same stuff
there were at least twenty three studies published in the
last seven or eight years that confirm the impact specifically
of these toxic heavy metals on the healthy development of children.
These studies are available. These studies are things that manufacturers
(33:39):
of baby food would have been well aware of at
the time, at least in part. It appears, according to
congress because their own internal testing confirmed it.
Speaker 3 (33:50):
Yeah, So let's now jump to the FDA and like,
what do they say, what are the safe levels of
some of these heavy metals? Are there any safe levels?
What is that look like? How do you measure that
kind of stuff? Well, in order to get a handle
on this, we are forced to look at drinking water
statistics and FDA FDA guidelines and a couple like EPA
(34:14):
guidelines for drinking water. So, according to this Congressional report,
and according to the Food and Drug Administration, the FDA
has a limit allowable level of some of this stuff
in bottled water. So when you're talking about when you're
talking about arsenic, it's ten parts per billion of this
inorganic arsenic, this particular type of the metal. When you're
(34:37):
talking about lead, it's capped at five parts per billion.
As the allowable amount and cadmium five parts per billion, okay,
so really low ten five and five parts per billion
to be safe in drinking water. The EPA, when it
looks at this, has capped the allowable level of mercury
(34:58):
in drinking water at two parts per billion. Again almost nothing,
almost zero. But then we got to look at the
test results of these baby foods and it is pretty
astounding the levels that were found.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
Right, the test results for baby food and their ingredients,
back to your earlier point, Matt, Congress says, they eclipse
those levels. There are results that are up to ninety
one times the allowable level of arsenic again embottled water,
up to one hundred and seventy seven times the level
(35:38):
of lead, sixty nine times nice the level of cadmium,
and up to five times the level of mercury. And again,
remember we said mercury is the one that seems to
occur the least often. So why are we using bottled water?
Why why did Matt, why did you say we're forced
to use the standards for bottled water.
Speaker 3 (36:00):
Well, that's because there are no FDA standards for these
heavy metals in baby food. They don't they don't exist.
There are no standards for them.
Speaker 1 (36:10):
That's wild.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
Why because their babies?
Speaker 1 (36:14):
Sorry sorry Noye the FDA.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
Yeah, it's just it feels like insanity. I don't understand.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
Yeah, it's unacceptable. And and you know, we want to
be clear when we're talking about institutions doing this kind
of stuff. We're not saying, uh, you working for the
FDA or your friend working for the FDA is somehow
inherently a bad person. These are things that happen collectively
with institutions. There. Maybe there were some lobbyists putting their
(36:50):
thumb on the scale. I would not at this point
be in the least surprised. Maybe there was just an
overwhelming amount of paperwork. But the end result is that
kids are literally eating lead and catiumin or a snake
in mercury. So that is where we are now. There
(37:14):
are some proposed limits, but the FDA doesn't have these
hard limits in That's why we had to compare it
to bottled water. What is to be done? Well, As
we said at the top, this does not have an
easy answer. There's not one particular institution that can correct it.
If the FDA came back today and said these levels
(37:38):
have to be this, then manufacturers would of course be
legally bound to scramble to meet those constraints. But look,
it's so easy to make someone the bad guy. It's
not as if these manufacturers are like sitting around on
their coffee break from their Illuminati meeting or their Bohemian
(38:01):
grove meeting and saying, you know what would be fine, Yeah,
would be like a real kick for all of us.
Since we're out of adrenochrome, why don't we just start
adding stuff to baby food. They didn't think about it
like that. They didn't scheme to purposefully put dangerous substances
in your children's food. That food comes from somewhere else.
(38:23):
It doesn't come from those factories, right, It comes from
the soil, and that food grows in the soil using
nutrients and using water. When the land and the water
and the air are contaminated, then we are already starting
out at a fundamental disadvantage in the supply chain. Even
if you're a billion dollar company. Right now, there are
(38:46):
only so many places in the world where you can
get certain crops. It's true. That's just a reality. It's
not a hot take. So these substances are also all
elements that are occurring in the wild now because they've
been frequently used in pesticides for like the last century
or so, and they didn't ever go away. They're still
(39:07):
in the soil, they're still in the groundwater, even if
they stopped being used in pesticides decades ago. That doesn't mean,
that doesn't mean the the missteps of the past were
somehow negated and the bill bill in short comes due.
Speaker 3 (39:25):
Yeah, that's very true. And there's also a lot of
these particularly lead that were just pumped out into the
air through automobiles for a long time. When you're thinking
about diesel and the lead that was contained in there,
lead paint, all kinds of lead products that just ended
up in the environment. There are a lot of reasons
that the soil itself, as you said, ben is going
(39:48):
to be contaminated, because the air was contaminated, because the
water was contaminated at some point, because X was contaminated
at some point and continues to be polluted and contaminated,
and it's it's it is a very tough situation. Knowing that,
knowing that I think it's around one percent of the
Earth's land area is actually able to be or to
(40:11):
be used for producing crops. It's a very small amount
of the earth that humanity can actually use to grow
its food. And you know, what are you going to
do when you can't use it? Let alone the whole
Was it the phosphorus? Yeah's the phosphorus thing where we're
running out. It really is on my mind.
Speaker 1 (40:32):
Dude, to take us in maybe a slightly less hopefully
less depressing tangent. Did you know that phosphorus is being
considered as one of the markers of possible life on
other planets or intelligent life like in the search in
the search for stuff, we've been the human species has
(40:55):
been looking for evidence of water, evidence of other thing
like carbon, et cetera. But phosphorus may end up being
the key. It's more important than a lot of people think.
Speaker 3 (41:06):
And don't don't let them fool you, Ben, They're just
looking for phosphorus so we can take it and bring
it back here because we need it.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
Phosphorus heist down, I would be I would crew on
that mission. According to the World Bank, the percentage of
arable land the well percentage of the world's total land
area that could be considered agricultural. It's pretty high. It's
thirty seven point seven percent, But the part that can
be considered arable land, which is what I think we're
(41:35):
really talking about, is only ten point six percent, and
that umber that number may decrease over time.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Well a little better than one percent. So thank goodness, well,
thank goodness for like.
Speaker 1 (41:47):
All right, but okay, so here's another question. If the
FDA has not set those minimal levels. It's a messed
up question, but it's on our show has to ask
are these manufacturers breaking the law in their conspiracy to
put profits over the health of children. It is a
conspiracy totally, but is it an a legal conspiracy at
(42:12):
this point?
Speaker 3 (42:14):
That's tough. I'll have them talk to my attorneys. Wait,
I'll have to hire some attorneys. But yeah, I don't
want to get sued by these guys, you know, by
Big Baby. No, please not that.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
So there are advocates who believe that there's a strong
legal case here. About a week after that report published
earlier this February, a law firm got involved. Their name
is balm hedlund Eristi and Goldman, and they have started
accepting lawsuitcases about toxic baby food for parents who purchase
(42:51):
food from any of those brands and have children who
have been diagnosed with autism or ADHD attention deficit hyperd
activity disorder. But again, but again, none of that cleanses
the ecosystem of these contaminants. And from what we understand
(43:12):
of the current science, nobody really knows how to one
hundred percent get the genie back in the bottle here,
or if there is a way, it's still largely theoretical,
and multiple institutions are unwilling to bear the cost of
the attempt itself. So the current hope right now, amidst
(43:35):
the nonprofit groups, the concerned parents, the politicians, everybody, is
that the findings of these and other studies might spur
manufacturers to do more testing and to change their practices
as much as possible to get these levels down. But
then we have to ask, We have to ask about
(43:55):
the other folks in the crowd, the other folks who
are affected by this supply chain, the parents, Like, what
if you are listening to this episode and this is
the first time you're learning about this, your first question
is what the hell do I do?
Speaker 2 (44:14):
Now?
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (44:15):
Yeah, what the hell do I do? And in order
to discuss that, you have to talk about a few things.
The first one is that it appears because of how
these heavy metals function. We are talking about a cumulative
effect when it comes to these things, and it's not
(44:36):
a you get dosed one time by eating, you know,
a particular baby food that has some arsenic in it,
and then now your child has issues. The problem is
it's cumulative. So I've been watching way too much daytime
TV where they've had experts on talking about this. Ben,
I've been watching so much. Do you remember that show
(44:57):
that Doctors? They really Yeah, they did a fairly good
job actually by having numerous experts on and getting some
competing opinions here. But the takeaway from all of them together,
I would say is that pediatricians say that you just
need to if you are feeding your child baby food,
(45:17):
you need to just limit the number of these things
they're eating and supplement it with really fresh fruits generally,
it's what they're saying, and grains not rice. That is
just the first thing. I'm just going to put that
out there. That's what I have heard, and that your
child is not, you know, in danger just for eating
(45:39):
you know, one pouch or whatever that has some of
these metals in.
Speaker 1 (45:43):
It, right, right, This is not a death sentence. This
is there's an accumulative aggregate effect at play with exposured
almost any substance.
Speaker 3 (45:52):
But it does make it there's a trust issue then
that I have, at least personally when it comes to
this stuff, because as a parent, it feels like my trust,
like the trust between me and these baby food manufacturers
has been broken. Then it's making me question, you know,
the advice I'm getting from daytime TV experts who are
being paid to go on television and you know who
(46:16):
a lot of times are sponsored by these big companies.
So it's tough to know. It's really tough to know.
The good thing is that there are all kinds of
resources out there online that you can check out. You
can educate yourself, and you can make the best decisions,
you know, at least for that you can for you
(46:36):
and your family.
Speaker 1 (46:37):
Yeah. Yeah, And some of the nonprofits we mentioned earlier
have have advice as well on how to combat the
rate of heavy metal consumption by exactly as you described, Matt,
finding safer alternatives to baby foods that may be on
these lists or found to contain these substances, you know,
(47:00):
oatmeal instead of rice, cereal, or barley, et cetera. Maybe
frozen bananas to replace teething cookies or biscuits. However, as
any current or expecting parent knows, the world is full
of advice for you. The cup of unsolicited parenting advice
(47:20):
runneth over, you know, like, and these sources of advice
are not created equally. Don't be fooled. I mean you
don't don't assume that everybody's automatically a bad actor. But
don't let someone's opinion or persuasive writing fool you into
thinking what you are reading is automatically factual. It stinks
(47:43):
right now that the burden of research is on people
who have often just entered the busiest time of their
adult lives and are trying to like sleep occasionally. It
stinks that part of that part of that burden falls
on you as a parent, to do the digging, do
the research. To not be afraid of writing directly to
(48:08):
companies with questions if you don't feel like you're getting
satisfactory answers searching online. I guarantee you these companies have
people whose entire job, their full time job, is to
field and answer these questions, so they will be there
and then even if you find a blog that you
(48:28):
really like, look for the science, look for the boring stuff,
look for the numbers, look for the studies. That congressional
report is available freely online. The studies that we mentioned
are also freely available online. This stuff is not you know,
this is not a secret military program. Hopefully this stuff
should all be declassified and for public consumption. And now
(48:51):
we arrive at your part of the story, fellow conspiracy realists.
As Matt and I said at the top, we need
your help. How do you think this contamination can or
should be addressed? Do these companies owe any kind of
compensation to the children and the parents involved? I mean,
how would that even work? That's a huge question. And
(49:14):
perhaps most importantly, do you have a personal story or
experience you would like to share with us or your
fellow listeners. If so, please let us know. We try
to be easy to find online.
Speaker 3 (49:27):
Yeah, that's right. You can find us on Facebook and Twitter,
where you are a conspiracy Stuff Conspiracy Stuff show. On Instagram,
you can check out Here's where it Gets Crazy. That
is our group on Facebook with by the way, some
of the best mods on the planet, coolest human beings
you will ever meet. Hopefully you won't cross them and
(49:48):
have to meet them that way, you'll meet them in
a happy way. And here's where it gets crazy. If
you don't like using social media, well, hey, you can
find us via phone.
Speaker 1 (50:01):
Yes, that's right, Matt. We have a phone number one
eight three three st d wytk cal. You'll hear, you'll
hear a voicemail message. You'll have three minutes. Those three
minutes belong to you. We can't wait to hear from you.
We have some tips for you that will help you
(50:21):
help you get around some of the weirdness of speaking
into the void for three minutes. First, go ahead and
open with your name or your nickname and let us
know whether or not you are okay with your voice
and name being used on air or your nickname. Second,
tell us what's going on, give us the scoop, give
(50:42):
us the skinny, hip us, hip us to the story.
And then third, if there's anything you want to just
say to us, then leave that for the end. If
it's something you just want Matt, Nole, Alexis or Paul
or me to know. And then fourth, last thing most important,
if there's a really long story that's on your mind,
(51:05):
go ahead and write to us at our email address.
We'll give you that email address. We made some pretty
good progress I think, going through our voicemail queue, and you.
Speaker 3 (51:17):
Talk about you did Ben, you did that, dude, We
thank you.
Speaker 1 (51:21):
We did it. And Matt had to be a one
man army for a very long time. So we instituted
something that without any hint of irony or pretension. We
were calling operations scorched earth, voicemail.
Speaker 3 (51:36):
Scorched mail.
Speaker 1 (51:38):
That was better. We should have That's what we should
have gotten with. But so we can't wait to hear
from you. But if you do not feel comfortable with
the social needs, if you don't really dig using the phone,
totally get it. That's why we are always here for you.
There's one easy way you can always contact us. That's
(51:59):
our good fashioned email address.
Speaker 3 (52:01):
Where we are conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff they
(52:24):
don't want you to know is a production of iHeartRadio.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know News
Hosts And Creators
Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
Show Links
RSSStoreAboutLive ShowsPopular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Betrayal Weekly
Betrayal Weekly is back for a new season. Every Thursday, Betrayal Weekly shares first-hand accounts of broken trust, shocking deceptions, and the trail of destruction they leave behind. Hosted by Andrea Gunning, this weekly ongoing series digs into real-life stories of betrayal and the aftermath. From stories of double lives to dark discoveries, these are cautionary tales and accounts of resilience against all odds. From the producers of the critically acclaimed Betrayal series, Betrayal Weekly drops new episodes every Thursday. If you would like to share your story, you can reach out to the Betrayal Team by emailing them at betrayalpod@gmail.com and follow us on Instagram at @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts. Please join our Substack for additional exclusive content, curated book recommendations, and community discussions. Sign up FREE by clicking this link Beyond Betrayal Substack. Join our community dedicated to truth, resilience, and healing. Your voice matters! Be a part of our Betrayal journey on Substack.