Is Using Plastic For Food Storage Safe?
Food has been stored by people in plastic containers for quite some time. There is now a question of food safety and the usage of plastics to store food. The internet is a useful tool for locating results and information from ongoing studies and research regarding food safety, the prevention of food poisoning from E. coli or salmonella, or to find out about diseases that plastics can cause or exacerbate.
Phthalates, or endocrine disrupting chemicals also known as EDCs, are found in plastic, as proved by research. Disruption of the receptors for sex hormones and cancer can be caused by these chemicals. To keep from this sort of contamination, you should not use plastic containers to keep food. Rather, containers made of glass or steel should be used, which will stop phthalates from oozing out of plastic and into your food.
Most articles on the subject of food safety and using plastic containers will cite people's concerns over having food cooked in microwaves using plastic dishes. Although there are no solid numbers regarding the validity of this fear, many professionals think there is a possibility of a danger. Being mindful of prevention, it's usually recommended that the use of plastic containers in microwave food cooking be avoided, and that should you do so, at the very least refrain from using plastic cling wrap that directly touches the food.
Water that is stored in bottles is an additional food safety problem. Most of the human body consists of water, so to keep in good health you have to replenish it every day by drinking a lot of water. As the number of people who exercise on a regular basis to stay healthy increases, so does the number of people who drink bottled water to rehydrate themselves. Water is a solvent, sometimes referred to as the universal solvent; hence, water in plastic bottles could contain phthalates which have seeped out of the plastic into the water. Individuals either decide to not use bottled water or they just don't pay attention to the warnings, since it's become a handy way to get a drink while you're out and about. The danger increases the longer the water remains in the bottle, as well as with wide variations in temperature.
Food safety studies often vary a great deal with different researchers and people funding them. The research results that are out there, therefore, are fuzzy and can be interpreted many ways. Until additional research is conducted on plastics and the effects they can have on people, using steel or glass containers to store food and water would be a wise choice, as well as entirely avoiding the use of plastics in microwaves.
|