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Show METALS IN FOOD SUPPLIES Lemonade, One of Most Popular American Amer-ican Drinks, Said to Contain Poisonous Lead. A pure food Investigation by Dr. Carlo Formenti, of Milan, has dealt with poisonous metals in food supplies. sup-plies. Most metal salts are poisonous, and are liable to occur in acid foods and drinks from chemical action on containing vessels. Lemonades and other acid drinks so popular in America, Amer-ica, and even carbonated waters, often contain lead. This comes not only from metal utensils used in preparing .the drinks, but also as impurities in tartaric acid and In carbon dioxide gas; and even in minute quantity taken often may be a real danger, as lead tends to accumulate In the tissues of the body until it causes illness or even death. Copper was found in nearly all canned green vegetables, its use for tinting such products being emphatically condemned. The finding of much manganese in certain vinegars vine-gars was a surprise, but special inquiry in-quiry showed that potassium permanganate perman-ganate is used to correct the taste of cheap vinegars made from refuse and rotting fruit. Though the manganese is probably not harmful, vinegar from such materials should be prohibited. Arsenic in wines sometimes comes from insecticides used on vines, and the use of arsenical insecticides was lately forbidden in France. The investigator in-vestigator recommends aluminum cooking and containing vessels as quite harmless. |