 Dietary practices influence our exposure to pesticides, toxic heavy metals and industrial pollutants. A diet high in fish and other animal products, for example, results in greater exposure to these pollutants than does a more plant-based diet, because these compounds may accumulate up the food chain. Researchers at UC Davis analyzed the diets of children and adults in California to see just how bad things have gotten. Cancer benchmark levels were exceeded by all children. 100% of children tested for arsenic, the banned pesticides Deldren and DDT, metabolite DDE, as well as dioxins, and not just by a little. More than 100 times the acceptable daily exposure for arsenic in preschoolers, school-age children, parents, and older adults. About 10 times the acceptable levels for these various pesticides and up to 1,000 times the daily dose for dioxins. Where are all these toxins coming from? The number one source of dioxins in the diets of Californian preschoolers, kids, parents, and grandparents appears to be dairy, dairy, dairy, dairy. Followed by meat, then white potatoes, refined grains, mushrooms, poultry fish. Our DDT legacy these days is also mostly from dairy. Deldren was created as a safe for all alternative to DDT, but was banned two years later in 1974, though still found in our bodies mostly thanks to dairy, meat, and evidently cucumbers. Chloridane made it into the 80s before being banned, though were still exposed through dairy and kukes. Lead is also food-wise mostly from dairy, and mercury, not surprisingly mostly from tuna and other seafood. But arsenic was surprising, mostly from chicken in children. Why? Let me tell you a tale of arsenic in chicken. Arsenic is well known as a poison by anyone who reads mysteries or the history of the Borges. With its long and colorful history, arsenic is not something that people want in their food. So when a biostat student went to the USDA 17 years ago in search of a project for his master's degree, he decided to look into it. And what he found was this startling difference. Arsenic levels in chicken were like three times that of other meats. His veterinary colleagues were like, duh, though. I mean, don't you know we feed four different types of arsenic-containing antibiotic drugs to poultry since, you know, like 1944? So while arsenic-based drugs have been fed to poultry since the 40s, recognition of this source of exposure for humans only occurred after this student churned through the data. It was published in 2004, expanded upon in 2006. The National Chicken Council was none too pleased saying lots of foods are contaminated with arsenic by focusing specifically on chicken. The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy makes it clear that their true objective is to force chicken producers to stop using these safe and effective products, by which they mean these arsenic-containing drugs, which they admit to using, but say don't worry, they use organic arsenic, not the inorganic form made infamous in arsenic and old lace. That is apparently until you cook it. When you cook chicken, it appears some of the arsenic drug in the meat turns into the arsenic and old lace variety. And so, the Poison-Free Poultry Act of 2009 was introduced into Congress. You can tell how well that did based on the subsequent introduction of the Poison-Free Poultry Act of 2011. Twist they said, poison, poor poultry, fish, posh. And so in 2013, a coalition of nine groups got together and sued the FDA. And by December 31st 2015, all arsenic-containing poultry drugs were withdrawn. And so as of 2016, arsenic will no longer be fed to chickens. The bad news is that without the arsenic-containing drug-rocks-arsone chicken may lose some of its appealing pink color. In the end, the poultry industry only got away with exposing the American public to arsenic for 72 years. It should be noted that the European Union had never approved such drugs in the first place, saying, Feed our animals arsenic, no thanks, nine danka, no grazzi, no merci. Europe also longed since banned the urgent threat to human health posed by feeding farm animals millions of pounds of human antibiotics, a problem that gets worse every year instead of better, including chickens in mass literally tons of drugs like tetracycline and penicillins to fatten them faster, dating back to 1951, where drug companies whipped out the all caps to promise big profits. A dangerous practice the poultry industry had gotten away with for 66 years and counting.