Some additives like tartrazine (yellow colour 102) and aspartame (951, a sweetener in soft drinks) are banned in various countries but yet – they are still used!  I first started to look at food additives in the quest to reduce the possibility of the onset of asthma, from which

I decided, that if I could eliminate every other possible trigger like food additives, cleaning chemicals, certain plants around the garden and dust as much as possible, then in times of sickness or unfavourable weather conditions, we would not suffer as much.  After a whole year almost without using ventolin, I truly believe my efforts have paid off.  Not only  have we reduced the incidence of asthma but we have also discovered the behavioural effects of colours, preservatives, artificial sweeteners and flavour enhancers in food on myself and my son in particular. 

I already knew that my sisters had had reactions to certain additives so it was no surprise.  I have always suffered many headaches (I have now narrowed down to calcium proprionate – 282, a preservative found in bread and frozen pasta) and wish that I had have discovered this information earlier and maybe I wouldn’t have had so many days off work.  I always thought it was hormonal but the headaches could come anytime, and no matter how many pain relievers I took, I couldn’t even eat anything but fruit for a day and obviously my body must have just known that I had experienced an overload of a particular additive.

What gets me is that all the food in Australia is labeled in accordance with a particular standard and each food probably has no more than the legal limit, but what we don’t know is how much of an additive we are actually consuming and I have never come across any literature of this.  So in effect, by the time we buy all our packaged goods for our kids to eat with all their favourite characters on the front we have no idea what sort of levels they are really consuming. 

I’m no professional expert in the area of nutrition or in behavioural problems but my opinion from what I have read is – no wonder ADHD and other disorders are on the rise.

On a positive note however, I have noticed that many companies are turning around their views and an increasing number of products are now not containing artificial colours and flavourings or not containing preservatives.  What not everyone realizes is though that some natural additives like 160b annatto which is in almost every flavoured yoghurt, icecream, spreadable butter and margarine has also presented behavioural problems in children.

Please take the time to read your labels.  A great book that helped me is Bill Stanton’s “The Chemical Maze”.  You can find it online at the following stores:

Seek Books.com.au

Buy Australian Books

Amazon