American Botanical Council Bulletin on Milk Thistle Adulterants

Torey
Torey Posts: 5,679 admin
edited October 2020 in Other News

The American Botanical Council puts out bulletins to notify practitioners, patients, manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers of plant products that may be adulterated with substances that are similar in appearance or action but not the actual product that is being marketed.

This one is regarding Milk Thistle. http://abc.herbalgram.org/site/MessageViewer?em_id=47723.0&dlv_id=104956

This is one really good reason for making our own medicinal products.

We will post more of these articles as they are published as this is very important information to be aware of when purchasing products.

Thanks to @LaurieLovesLearning for bringing this up.

Comments

  • karenjanicki
    karenjanicki Posts: 996 ✭✭✭✭

    Thank you for bringing this to our attention!

  • tomandcara
    tomandcara Posts: 712 ✭✭✭✭

    I knew someone who did his PhD thesis on turmeric and part of that work was looking at adulterants. The worst sample of turmeric he found was from a small market and it contained 100% brick dust!

  • Tave
    Tave Posts: 952 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I found fresh turmeric at the local farmers market, and the lady selling it asked me what it was for. I told her the name in Spanish (they usually sell it in a powder and use it to give food a more appetizing color), and she responded, "oh, that's interesting because the powder we sell is not pure." I was afraid to ask what they put in it.

  • Torey
    Torey Posts: 5,679 admin

    This is a link to the ABC Bulletin on Turmeric Adulterants.

    http://cms.herbalgram.org/BAP/BAB/TurmericRootandRhizomeandExtracts.html

  • LaurieLovesLearning
    LaurieLovesLearning Posts: 7,576 admin

    Brick dust. Ew...but you could taste that.

    I have heard bad things about lead giving ground turmeric its color and also some places even dipping the root to give it more color. This fetches a higher price for a poor product.

    Everytime I look at my turmeric, I wonder if it is pure. Stores most likely don't ask and not all the "protective" inspection agencies catch it all.

    I can't grow it here, so that's out of the question, but that would be the best way to avoid all of these problems.

    Now, milk thistle...I bought seeds for that.

  • tomandcara
    tomandcara Posts: 712 ✭✭✭✭

    @Tave maybe they were using it for dyeing something?

    @torey Great link Thank you.

    @LaurieLovesLearning I know ew! I am thinking the market selling the brick dust possibly started intentionally adulterating their turmeric and gradually increased the amount as their customers got used to it? Who knows? Reading the link @torey posted, I didn't see brick dust listed as an adulterant in any of the studies they referenced.

  • Tave
    Tave Posts: 952 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @tomandcara It's amazing how many ingredients are not required to be on the label. And if you buy in bulk, there's usually no label. Stretching spices with cheap ingredients, like flour, is a common practice here. Asking doesn't usually help as many of the vendors don't even know what they're selling. I think wine is one of the worst. The owner of Dry Wine Farms said that, in the States, winemakers are allowed to use over 70 chemicals without putting them on the label.

  • tomandcara
    tomandcara Posts: 712 ✭✭✭✭

    Hi @Tave , I thought I replied to this yesterday, but obviously I didn't. My wife and I don't drink wine, but we do use it for cooking. For quite a few years we have only purchased organic wines because of this reason, however, now you have me wondering. Do you know anything about organic wines? Are they as clean as we are thinking?


    If that isn't enough questions for you, here a couple more. Am I correct in assuming you live somewhere other than USA? If so, do you mind letting us know where that is?


    Thank you and have a pleasant day

  • Tave
    Tave Posts: 952 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @tomandcara Todd White of Dry Farm Wines said in an interview a while back that he doesn't use any wine from the States because none of it passed lab testing. I don't know if that has changed. I've lost faith in much of organic certification because of corruption in the organizations that are responsible for the certification (it's mostly about the money). Certified organic is definitely still better than conventional, but the farmers can't always control what the wind blows onto their farms from neighboring non-organic vineyards. And winemakers are still allowed to use "organic" additives in their wine without saying anything.

    By the way, Dry Farm Wines has a reasonable prices on their completely natural wines.

    I moved to Bolivia 9 years ago to do volunteer education, and I live in wine country close to the border of Argentina.



  • tomandcara
    tomandcara Posts: 712 ✭✭✭✭

    Thank you for the information @Tave. It is sad that the organic certification has so little value, but I believe it. We will look into the dry farm wines because of your knowledge and recommendation.