Contents:
- Medical Video: Stop Using These Immediately| Most Common And Harmful Products
- The danger of stytofoam comes from the basic ingredients
- Factors that can make food contaminated with chemicals in styrofoam
- Styrofoam food containers on the market are generally safe
- What health problems can occur due to styrene substance contamination?
- How to prevent the danger of styrofoam from food containers?
Medical Video: Stop Using These Immediately| Most Common And Harmful Products
How often do you use Styrofoam as a food container? Although very practical and inexpensive, the use of styrofoam is said to cause cancer and various other chronic diseases. Is it true? What are the dangers of Styrofoam as a food container, and whether we can prevent it
The danger of stytofoam comes from the basic ingredients
Styrofoam is arguably included in a group of plastics that are often used as food or beverage containers. Many people use styrofoam as a container because the price is cheap and practical in its use. But the side effects caused are quite bad
Styrofoam contains several chemicals that are believed to be harmful to human health. Some of them are benzene and styrene which have been proven to cause cancer.
Even the world health agency, the World Health Organization has stated that benzene is a chemical that is carcinogenic, or can cause the growth of cancer cells in the body. While the fact for styrene, is not much different from benzene, this substance also has a negative impact on health.
Factors that can make food contaminated with chemicals in styrofoam
Actually, the danger of styrofoam comes from styrene contamination in your food. The transfer of this substance depends on several things, namely:
- Food temperature. The higher the temperature of food in styrofoam, the easier styrene substances will be to move to food. Therefore, avoid using Styrofoam in heating food, or to store food in hot temperatures.
- Long contact with food. The longer you store food in styofoam, the more harmful it will be to your health.
- High fat food. Foods that have high fat content will get more styrene contamination than with foods with little fat. Even so, experts have not yet known exactly why food fat affects the transfer of styrene into your diet.
Styrofoam food containers on the market are generally safe
However, WHO states that styrene will not pose a health hazard if it does not exceed 5000 ppm in the body. While food packaging or styrofoam, which is often used to store food, only releases styrene as much as about 0.05 ppm.
Therefore, the Indonesian Drug Control Agency states that Styrofoam is safe for food.
What health problems can occur due to styrene substance contamination?
Styrofoam hazards are indeed caused by the transfer of chemicals in styrofoam to your food. some things that might be experienced if the transfer of the substance occurs:
- Causes disorders of the nervous system
- Having a headache
- Increases the risk of leukemia and lymphoma
- Can interfere with fetal development and growth and cause birth defects
How to prevent the danger of styrofoam from food containers?
Indeed styrofoam has been declared safe to use. But the dangers of styrofoam can still lurk you if you do not pay attention to various things that can increase contamination of styrene substances. Here are ways to prevent the dangers of Styrofoam that you often use:
- Do not use Styrofoam repeatedly. Use it only for one time use.
- Avoid using Styrofoam for hot food.
- Do not use Styrofoam as a food container to be heated.
- Avoid direct contact with Styrofoam, you can give plastic or rice paper as a base for Styrofoam.
- If food is acidic, contains a lot of fat or alcohol, you should avoid using Styrofoam.
