How Food Packaging Interacts With Your Health
Plastic bottles and containers in bottles and containers wholesale stores and home improvement stores commonly feature prominent labels that declare they are “BPA-free” and/or “PFASs-free”.
But what does this actually mean? What motivated the initial addition of these chemicals to these foods, and what scientific evidence led to their removal? In addition, what have many of these products switched to since removing these chemicals?
These are just a few examples of the many questions that may be asked to maintain a healthy lifestyle as people become more aware of and concerned about the chemicals that may enter their bodies through food packaging.
The way we interact with packaging is, well, complex. So let’s have a look at some important factors of food packaging relevant to our health.
Prevention Of Food Spoilage
Pollutants and germs can contaminate foods anywhere they are made or cultivated. In addition, the risk of contamination increases for foods that are shipped or stored for long periods of time. That’s why checking the integrity of your custom food packaging boxes and using the proper packaging is crucial.
The food industry should use package leak detectors and seal integrity testers for quality control in their food packaging applications.
Poor packaging compromises not only the safety and freshness of the food within but also the health of the purchasers.
Possible Chemical Exposures from Food Packaging
It’s common knowledge that some chemicals from food packaging can seep into the food itself, but researchers and regulators are starting to ask how much migration actually occurs and what the health impacts might be.
Unfortunately, there has been a dearth of research into the negative impact of these exposures on human health.
Potential chemical exposures vary depending on the type of packing material used. In this regard, the FDA has determined that glass containers are GRS (Generally Recognized as Safe). Unfortunately, lead has been found in some vintage glassware.
Waters packaged in glass bottles were found to have 26-57 times more lead than equivalent waters bottled in polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic, according to a study conducted by researchers at the Institute of Environmental Geochemistry.
Food Packaging And Environmental Impacts Being Mitigated?
Source reduction, reuse, and recycling are all ways people try to mitigate the negative effects of packaging on the environment.
Reduction
Lighten up by using less of everything to manufacture the same packing, and you’ve got a source reduction strategy.
Over the past decade, the weight of glass containers has decreased by nearly half, while between the 1970s and the 2000s, the weight of two-liter PET soft-drink bottles decreased by 25%, the weight of aluminum cans decreased by 26%, and the weight of steel cans and plastic grocery sacks decreased by 40%. 33,34.
Using pouches constructed from a thin film of plastic and other materials is another lightweight method. Ecolean, a Swedish packaging innovator, has created a one-liter bag that weighs only 16 grams, or nearly half as much as a one-liter polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottle.
Reuse
One more way businesses can practice source reduction is by switching to refillable or reusable containers. In some parts of Britain, where milk production is local, reusable milk bottles are still in use despite having fallen out of favor in the United States.
Half of all soft drinks, all mineral water, and the vast majority of beer are sold in refillable bottles.
Recycle
Bottle bills, or legislation requiring adding a monetary deposit of 5-10 to the goods and reimbursement upon redemption of the empty container, are an effective way to promote recycling.
Only ten of the fifty United States states have such legislation on the books at the present time: California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Oregon, and Vermont (unclaimed deposits, which can amount to millions of dollars annually, revert to the state and/or bottlers and distributors).
The non-profit Container Recycling Institute reports that the beverage container recycling rate is only around 24% in states without bottle bills, whereas it is above 60% in states with bottle bills.
Potential for Enhancement
Despite the benefits of food packaging including disposables, bottles, and wholesale rigid boxes, in terms of hygiene and accessibility, research like this highlights the need for a fuller comprehension of the extent to which food is contaminated with chemicals due to its packaging.
In a 2007 review of packaging contaminants in European food, Swiss researchers Koni Grob, as well as colleagues from the Official Food Control Authority of Canton of Zürich, hypothesized that the mobility of pollutants from food packaging might very well vastly exceed that of other pollutants, such as pesticide residues and environmental pollutants.
Conclusion
Food packaging is the most important factor in preventing food poisoning in terms of human health. Maintaining people’s health and happiness relies heavily on the availability of safe food.
The packaged food will remain in good condition throughout transport, handling, and storage. The integrity of food packaging is crucial to ensuring its contents remain uncontaminated during transport and storage.
A wide variety of environmental hazards, including contamination, heat, and physical damage, can be avoided by properly packaging food. Thus, using appropriate packaging ensures the maximum safety of your food goods.
