025: The Chemicals We Eat through Food Packaging with Maricel Maffini
12/04/19 • 8 min
Don’t you just enjoy the popping sound of popcorn as it sits inside the microwave, ready for your relaxing movie night?
But what might be scarier than your horror movie (if you're watching one), is knowing that there are chemicals from the packaging of your microwaveable popcorn transferred into your movie snack which you already ingested.
Today we are joined by Researcher, Maricel Maffini. She discusses with us a summary of her presentation from the UNWRAPPED about the chemicals in packaging that transfer to our food and the ways in which the chemicals come out of the packaging into your food.
In this Episode, We Discuss:
- A summary of Maricel Maffini’s presentation on the UNWRAPPED Conference
- Chemicals added to make the plastic more flexible
- Ways in which chemicals come out from the packaging
- Microwave safe vs Health safe
- Lipophilic plastics, PFAS, and PVCs
- Supporting companies that have a safety product policy
Get to know Maricel Maffini:
Dr. Maricel V. Maffini is an Independent Consultant. She holds a doctorate degree in Biological Sciences. She has more than 25 years of research experience in the fields of carcinogenesis, reproductive biology, and endocrine disruption.
For the past nine years, Dr. Maffini has conducted research and published on the U.S. food additive regulatory program, conflicts of interest and regulatory science. Her current work focuses on environmental health issues related to chemical safety with special emphasis on food chemicals, risk assessment, and science policy.
She has authored numerous peer-reviewed journal articles, reviews, and book chapters. Before becoming a consultant, she was a senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a senior science officer at The Pew Charitable Trust, and a Research Assistant Professor at Tufts University School of Medicine.
To know more about the Unwrapped conference you may check their website here.
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Don’t you just enjoy the popping sound of popcorn as it sits inside the microwave, ready for your relaxing movie night?
But what might be scarier than your horror movie (if you're watching one), is knowing that there are chemicals from the packaging of your microwaveable popcorn transferred into your movie snack which you already ingested.
Today we are joined by Researcher, Maricel Maffini. She discusses with us a summary of her presentation from the UNWRAPPED about the chemicals in packaging that transfer to our food and the ways in which the chemicals come out of the packaging into your food.
In this Episode, We Discuss:
- A summary of Maricel Maffini’s presentation on the UNWRAPPED Conference
- Chemicals added to make the plastic more flexible
- Ways in which chemicals come out from the packaging
- Microwave safe vs Health safe
- Lipophilic plastics, PFAS, and PVCs
- Supporting companies that have a safety product policy
Get to know Maricel Maffini:
Dr. Maricel V. Maffini is an Independent Consultant. She holds a doctorate degree in Biological Sciences. She has more than 25 years of research experience in the fields of carcinogenesis, reproductive biology, and endocrine disruption.
For the past nine years, Dr. Maffini has conducted research and published on the U.S. food additive regulatory program, conflicts of interest and regulatory science. Her current work focuses on environmental health issues related to chemical safety with special emphasis on food chemicals, risk assessment, and science policy.
She has authored numerous peer-reviewed journal articles, reviews, and book chapters. Before becoming a consultant, she was a senior scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council, a senior science officer at The Pew Charitable Trust, and a Research Assistant Professor at Tufts University School of Medicine.
To know more about the Unwrapped conference you may check their website here.
---
Did you enjoy today’s episode?
Thanks for listening! Be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast app to get notified immediately when a new episode comes out! If you enjoyed the Mercast, please click here to leave a review and share this episode with a friend!
I hope you spend some time in nature today! I'll catch you next time.
Subscribe to The Mercast
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Previous Episode
024: Dangers of Plastic Food Packaging with Dr. Jane Muncke
Plastic food packaging indeed protects our food but it can also be the source of chemical food contamination and increased risk in health. We don’t know every material used in making these packaging and this knowledge gap can actually hurt us.
Join me in this episode as we unfold the different packaging materials and chemicals that touch our food with Dr. Jane Muncke, the Managing Director and Chief Scientific Officer of the Food Packaging Forum.
In this conversation, she talks about the different packaging materials that are used to package food. She also explains the chemical migration in our food packaging, how plastic is made, what materials are considered safe that could pass the toxicology tests, and many more!
In this Episode, We Discuss:
- Different materials used in food packaging
- The known unknowns
- The chemical migration in our food packaging
- Single-use and reusables
- Plastic materials that could pass the toxicology test
Get to know Jane Muncke:
Dr. Jane holds a doctorate degree in environmental toxicology and an MSc in environmental science from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich.
She currently works as a Managing Director at the Food Packaging Forum, a science communication organization that provides independent and balanced information on issues related to food packaging and health. She is a full scientific member of the Society of Toxicology, the American Chemical Society, the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, and the Endocrine Society.
You can learn more about Dr. Jane’s work and achievements here.
References from this episode:
- Food Packaging Forum
- Subscribe here and stay up to date with the Food Packaging Forum’s newsletter and read about the latest news and scientific research!
---
Did you enjoy today’s episode?
Thanks for listening! Be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast app to get notified immediately when a new episode comes out! If you enjoyed the Mercast, please click here to leave a review and share this episode with a friend!
I hope you spend some time in nature today! I'll catch you next time.
Subscribe to The Mercast
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Next Episode
26: How The Food We Eat Impacts Our Health With Linda Birnbaum
You might think buying and eating organic food is good for you, which it is. But, what happens then if that organic product is put in a plastic container?
In today's episode, we are joined by Linda Birnbaum, the recently retired director of NIEHS, an institute dedicated to learning more about how the environment affects our health. In our conversation, Linda explains how the environment affects the food that we eat in various ways. She explains how fish has mercury from their food, or how organic food will affect us when placed in plastic containers.
In this Episode, We Discuss:
- A Summary of Linda Birnbaum’s Presentation from the UNWRAPPED Conference
- How our Environment affects the food that we eat
- BPA, BPS, BPAF
- Contamination in the environment
- Do we really need these chemicals or not
Get to know Linda Birnbaum:
Linda is the first board-certified toxicologist and the first woman to serve as Director of the NIEHS, which has a unique research mission to discover how the environment affects people’s health in order to promote healthier lives.
Under Linda’s leadership, the NIEHS became a world leader in toxicology and environmental health research, with NIEHS science inspiring health policy and safety standards in the United States and abroad. Scientific reports generated by the NTP, such as the bi-annual Report on Carcinogens, serve as major presentations of scientific analyses of substances in our environment that may cause cancer. The NIEHS also established a national network of exposure assessment laboratories with an innovative grant program called Children’s Health Exposure Analysis Resource. Research conducted by the NIEHS Children’s Centers cosponsored with the EPA, and related work with environmental justice communities has led to policy changes to protect the health of children through improvements in their environments.
To know more about the Unwrapped conference, please visit their website here.
---
Did you enjoy today’s episode?
Thanks for listening! Be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast app to get notified immediately when a new episode comes out! If you enjoyed the Mercast, please click here to leave a review and share this episode with a friend!
I hope you spend some time in nature today! I'll catch you next time.
Subscribe to The Mercast
++ Spotify
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