Do You Know About the Hidden Dangers in Your Food? "Food, Inc." The movie holds nothing back

August 5, 2009. I picked up BigDaddy, my 107 year old health bug and drove together to watch Food, Inc. open up at the Harkins Theater, in Scottsdale, Arizona. A yoga teacher Shanti, My raw-foodie friend Emma, and her boyfriend Adam joined us.

The movie covered the devastating effects of mass producing food has on our food quality. In the name of efficiency, most forms of meat are overprocessed. Scenes of the horrific conditions chickens, cows, and steer endured: from being hormonally and antibiotically-injected so chickens are virtually blind and almost cannot walk--which promotes allergies in those who eat them; to cattle and cows being fed corn instead of wheat--which led to an e. coli infection which killed a young boy Kevin within a month; to animals wallowing in their own feces, which promotes disease and bacteria. The conditions the workers toil under is also miserable; unsafe unsanitary conditions that aliens labor under, and they are constantly at risk of being deported.

The horror of this young boy Kevin dying from renal failure as a result of eating beef contaminated with e. coli is unforgivable when congress, lawmakers, and even the meat packaging companies refused to acknowledge the death or make any corrections or adjustments to their process. The law attempting to instill higher meat processing standards is called "Kevin's Law".

The movie contrasts this corporatized meat production with a natural farmer, who raises chickens and livestock under open air and with fresh hormone free organic feed. Although he states the health department tried to shut him down, the bacteria rating of the meat under his conditions was 3, compared to the meat produced under the mass-production facility, which was a hundred times higher.

Unfortunately, these processed foods are also much cheaper, which encourages consumers to purchase them instead. Also families on low incomes cannot afford higher quality organic foods. These foods that contain preservatives, including salt, sugar, etc. are highly addictive, and lead to obesity. Obesity, and diabetes in the U.S. have reached epidemic proportions because of the incredible amounts of sugar poured into processed food.

Worse yet, the FDA is in bed with the biggest food packagers and producers, which have now begun monopolizing the food production and distribution chain. For example, the movie cited several examples of attorneys who worked as executives for these companies also serve high level positions for the FDA. This leads to self-serving laws and policies that protect these companies at the expense of the consumers, and even farmers.

One tragic example of companies monopolizing the food chain is Monsanto, the food giant who is attempting to patent Genetically Modified (GMO)-soybeans which do not produce seed for future generations. Any farmer caught growing these Monsanto plants without permission is subject to copyright infringement and prosecution. Even a farmer who grows his own soybean crop could have an adjacent GMO crop contaminate his.

Despite the gloomy snapshot of the food supply, the promising news is that consumers are starting to vote with their wallets. This is impacting the buying decisions of big suppliers, including Wal-Mart. For example, Wal-Mart is now carrying many organic food labels to meet the consumer demand.

Here's what you can do:

1. Read and understand your food labels. Limit purchasing foods that contain sugar and preservatives.
2. Insist on purchasing organic foods whenever possible.
3. If you do purchase meat, insist on cage-free, organic, and hormone free whenever possible.
4. Write to your local representative and demand full disclosure of GMO-enhanced foods. In the same way that tobacco and cigarette labels now state the health risks as a result of pressure from public outcry, so can food producers eventually disclose food that is GMO.
5. Watch Food Inc and share it with your loved ones.