Food consumers seldom hear about the drugs oestradiol-17, zeranol, trenbolone acetate and melengestrol acetate and the names are certainly not on meat labels. But those synthetic growth hormones are central to U.S. meat production, especially beef, and the reason Europe has banned a lot of U.S. meat since 1989.

 Zeranol, widely used as a growth promoter in the U.S. beef industry, is a "powerful estrogenic chemical, as demonstrated by its ability to stimulate growth and proliferation of human breast tumor cells" similar to the "known carcinogen diethylstilbestrol (DES),"

The Breast Cancer Fund, dedicated to identifying and eliminating environmental causes of breast cancer, is a "powerful estrogenic chemical, as demonstrated by its ability to stimulate growth and proliferation of human breast tumor cells in vitro at potencies similar to those of the natural hormone estradiol and the known carcinogen diethylstilbestrol (DES)."

  "May be a risk factor for breast cancer," says the College of Food Science and Nutritional Engineering at China Agricultural University in Beijing. The Breast Cancer Fund, dedicated to identifying and eliminating environmental causes of breast cancer, agrees: The drug The use of Zeranol requires "Appropriate Personal Protective Equipment" according to its instructions for usage--"laboratory coat, gloves, safety glasses and mask." Why is it routinely used in U.S. meat production and not even labeled?

 Melengestrol acetate, a synthetic progestin put in feed, is 30 times as active as natural progesterone, says the European Commission (EC) and trenbolone acetate, a synthetic androgen, is several times more active than testosterone. Trenbolone acetate is administered as ear implants commonly seen at livestock operations. Operators say they--and the ears themselves--are thrown out at the slaughterhouse and don't enter the human food supply. Do they become feed for other livestock instead?

 “There is an association between steroid hormones and certain cancers and an indication that meat consumption is possibly associated with increased risks of breast cancer and prostate cancer,” says the European Commission's Scientific Committee on Veterinary Measures. “The highest rates of breast cancer are observed in North America, where hormone-treated meat consumption is highest in the world,” it says, adding that the same statistics apply to prostate cancer.

To continue reading:  http://www.alternet.org/speakeasy/martharosenberg/were-eating-what-...

Continue reading at: Red and the Blue; http://12160.info/group/red-and-the-blue/forum/topics/we-re-eating-...