Last month, I posted an article from the GoAnimal.com site that asked the $64,000 question when it comes to the health of most Americans: Is processed food "really" food? Virtually all of you reading my daily blog know the true answer to that rhetorical question I posed, thanks to pesticides, soy and genetically modified foods that dominate and poison this nation's grocery store shelves.
All that said, I'm baffled by the testing being conducted by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on the curative effect of sodium nitrate -- the chemical used to preserve hot dogs -- on patients in hopes of finding a "cheap" cure for heart attack, sickle cell anemia and even brain aneurysms!
Why the NIH so keen on sodium nitrate: The conditions I listed previously are connected to low oxygen levels the agency believes this chemical can treat.
For a century, scientists assumed sodium nitrate had little medical value, other than its use as an antidote for cyanide poisoning (although the "cure" could be just as deadly as the poison).
As the NIH and others plan to launch more studies to nail down the true effect of sodium nitrate, based on how processed foods can really affect your health, about the only good thing they're good for is making a fire.
USA Today September 5, 2005