Introduction
There was a time when the only ads that were played on television were of either Coke, Pepsi and citrus-flavored carbonated drinks such as Mountain Dew and Fanta and so on and so forth. And peppy (read: yuppy) ads they were… full of verve and panache and all that jazz.
Disgusting as it was to not only watch these unimaginative and boring ads (over and over again!), the drinks also got on my nerves as well, as the only 'burping' sound I considered permissible was after a full meal.
And somehow my policy of laying off the carbonated drinks has stayed with me even till today even though I was not aware of the dangers of 'brominated vegetable oil' that has only recently been banned in over 100 countries all around the world.
Brominated Vegetable Oil (BVO)
Very simply, brominated vegetable oil is a vegetable oil that has the element bromine bonded to it, which acts as a stabilizer and emulsifier in citrus-flavored drinks so that the flavors that are fat soluble remain suspended in the drink so as to produce a cloudy (and unified!) appearance.
How this is achieved is by increasing the density of oil (by the addition of bromine) so that it equals the density of the water in the drink, and this is how the brominated vegetable oil remains suspended in the water as a whole instead of forming seperate layers that would be embarrassing enough to say the least.
Products that contain BVO
Here are a list of products that contain brominated vegetable oils:
1) Non-alcoholic citrus-flavored sodas such as Gatorade, Powerade, Fresca, Fanta, Mountain Dew (Don't we all love Bromism?)
2) Light-sensitive photographic printing paper
3) As an additive for gasoline
4) Agricultural fumigants
5) Sedatives (until 1978)
Pros & Cons of Brominated Vegetable Oils
It is rather obvious to note from the last four products of BVOs that the cons outweigh the pros (if there any at all) and the health effects stem from a term known as 'bromism'.
As a person consumes a product that contains bromine as discussed earlier, this increases the bromine content in our body that ultimately causes iodine deficiency leading to a condition known as 'Brominated Thyroid'. It is also linked to serious conditions such as organ system damage, birth defects, growth defects, cancer, memory loss, heart and kidney disease as well as less devastating disorders such as fatigue, simple headaches and weight gain.
There's no doubt in the minds of people around the world that brominated vegetable oils are harmful for them, and thus have taken steps to ban them from soft drinks.
The U.S Food and Drug Administration though allows it to be used as an interim additive provided the finished products contains no more than 15 parts per million of BVO, and whose final fate will be decided based on further toxicology reports that will be presented in the future.
In Closing
What beats me is why people find the need to consume so much of these sodas as opposed to drinking water, although they are in bottles and we have to pay for them nowadays. And yes, one more thing… I've stopped watching television too because I got tired of watching shows between ads rather than vice-versa!
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