Mycotoxins=diabetes?

Age-standardised disability-adjusted life year (DALY) rates from Diabetes mellitus by country (per 100,000 inhabitants). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

By Lara/Trace

At my dentists office I was reading a very technical article about mycotoxins – which can be traced to molds and fungal infections. And then another article popped up about fungal infections causing infertility (more than anyone here in America has realized.) When doctors wanted to create diabetes in mice, they injected them with mycotoxins!

A few months ago I was told I am infertile, but at my age, it really didn’t matter since I am not trying to conceive. But I wondered where in the hell did I have exposure to mycotoxins – and it turns out it’s in many things, including cereal and what they inject beef cattle with… And I also found that fungal infections due to mycotoxins can be linked to cancer. [Mycotoxins are poisonous compounds that may, under some conditions, be produced by certain species of fungi or fungus.]

You might ask yourself why there are so many infertile people and humans suffering with diabetes and cancer. If there are so many infertile men and women, don’t they need to ask why and what is causing this? (end result: infertility causes a rise in adoption…)

I am just trying to connect the dots – so if you can help me, please send links to articles you find on mycotoxins. I’ll be looking at this more as a journalist. (leave a comment on this blog or email me tracedemeyer (at) yahoo (dot) com.

Since Indian Country is experiencing an epidemic of diabetes, and my own birth mother had diabetes, I think it’s time to research this.

The mycotoxins of most concern from a food safety perspective include the aflatoxins (B1, B2, G1, G2 and M1), ochratoxin A, patulin and toxins produced by Fusarium moulds, including fumonisins (B1, B2 and B3), trichothecenes (principally nivalenol, deoxynivalenol, T-2 and HT-2 toxin) and zearalenone.

Mycotoxins can cause a variety of adverse health effects in humans. Aflatoxins, including aflatoxin B1 are the most toxic and have been shown to be genotoxic i.e. can damage DNA and cause cancer in animal species. There is also evidence that they can cause liver cancer in humans. Other mycotoxins have a range of other health effects including kidney damage, gastrointestinal disturbances, reproductive disorders or suppression of the immune system. For most mycotoxins, a tolerable daily intake (TDI) has been established, which estimates the quantity of mycotoxin which someone can be exposed to daily over a lifetime without it posing a significant risk to health.

Related articles

• Mold-The Silent Health threat & the Sicknesses it Can Cause (momsmoldresources.wordpress.com)
• Mold – The “New” Hidden Pandemic Sweeping Across America (momsmoldresources.wordpress.com)
• Experts Alert Doctors of Oklahoma Tornado Victims of Mold Infections; My Cleaning Products Suggests Solutions to Effectively and Safely Counter Impending Mold Problems (prweb.com)
• Post-tornado peril: Deadly fungal infections (vitals.nbcnews.com)
• http://mycotoxins.org/
• http://www.food.gov.uk/policy-advice/mycotoxins/#.UaznrRXD85s

• UK Completed Projects (http://mycotoxins.org/)

  www.mycotoxin-prevention.com Hazard analysis and control of food contaminants Prevention of Ochratoxin A in Cereals

• www.seedcentre.nl   Safe Organic Vegetables – The development of strategies to ensure a safe organic food supply by minimising mycotoxin risks.www.ochra-wine.com   Risk Assessment and Integrated Ochratoxin A (OTA) Management in Grapes and         Wine (Wine – Ochra Risk)www.boku.ac.at/fucomyr/   Novel Tools for Developing Fusarium Resistant and Toxin Free Wheat for Europe

  www.iutox.org/Flyer_OTA.pdf  Ochratoxin A -Risk Assessment – Mechanisms of OTA induced carcinogenicity as a basis for improved risk assessment

  www.rafbca.com   Risk Assessment of Biocontrol Agents

  www.mycotoxin-prevention.com/PD/kaiser.pdf   Development of a novel test kit for the rapid on-site determination of  mycotoxins in foods (Mycosens)

  http://cost835.ba.cnr.it/  Agriculturally important toxigenic fungi (Cost Action 835)

  www.plant.wageningen-ur.nl/projects/fusarium/   Mycotoxins in the Cereal Chain

  http://mycoglobe.ispa.cnr.it/  MYCO-GLOBE – Research for Food Safety in Global System

  www.coffee-ota.org/   Reducing Ochratoxin A in Coffee – project of the FAO of the UN

  www.mycoplex.de/     Mycoplex – Development of immuno-pcr assay for the detection and quantification of Ochratoxin and Aflatoxin in complex matrices