Sodium Benzoate: Reducing Soda’s Harm to the Liver

Also known as disease management, protecting your liver is typically met with learning how to live healthfully, by instituting the following six, lifestyle changes:

1. Emphasize the importance of restful sleep

2. Exercise regularly

3. Minimize stress and learn how to relieve it

4. Choose nourishing food and beverages

5. Avoid detrimental food and beverages

6. Take herbal supplements to help preserve liver health

As part of the typical American’s beverage preference, soda belongs on a list of items to avoid when managing liver disease. The list of ingredients in some soft drinks that are controversial for promoting a healthful lifestyle, include high fructose corn syrup, aspartame, caffeine, phosphoric acid and, most recently put under the microscope, sodium benzoate.

Sodium Benzoate

Due to its ability to keep soft drinks fresh and prevent harmful bacteria from growing, sodium benzoate has been used in soft drinks for many years. While the food agencies in the United States and Europe approve sodium benzoate as a safe substance, there is plenty of evidence to the contrary. This common preservative has been implicated in being a detriment to our health by possibly forming a toxic chemical and by causing human DNA damage.

1. Creating a Toxic Chemical – In order to preserve liver health, people managing liver disease strive to avoid ingesting anything toxic. In 2006, fear around sodium benzoate revolved around evidence of its potential to cause cancer when combined with ascorbic acid, otherwise known as vitamin C. Under the right conditions, the combination of sodium benzoate and vitamin C can create the carcinogenic chemical, benzene.

Linked to cancer in humans, benzene is a chemical released into the air from automobile emissions and burning coal and oil. Benzene is also used extensively in industries producing chemicals, dyes, detergents, synthetic fibers, solvents, rubber and some plastics. Workers exposed to these substances are at a high risk of developing cancer, due to their chronic benzene exposure. Following the British Food Standards Agency investigation of this allegation, four soft drinks were pulled from store shelves in the United Kingdom due to high levels of benzene. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration reported finding a high level of benzene in five of the 100 soft drinks and beverages tested:

· Safeway Select Diet Orange

· AquaCal Strawberry Flavored Water Beverage

· Crystal Light Sunrise Classic Orange

· Giant Light Cranberry Juice Cocktail

· Crush Pineapple

The FDA said that after alerting these companies about the high levels of benzene in their beverage, all agreed to reformulate their drinks.

2. DNA Damage – Damage to the DNA of a liver cell can foster that cell’s death and possibly create a cancerous cell. Professor Peter Piper, a professor of molecular biology and biotechnology at Britain’s Sheffield University, tested the impact of sodium benzoate on living yeast cells in his laboratory. What he found alarmed him: the sodium benzoate was damaging an important area of DNA in the “power station” of cells known as the mitochondria. According to Piper, “these chemicals (sodium benzoate) have the ability to cause severe damage to DNA in the mitochondria to the point that they totally inactivate it, they knock it out altogether. The mitochondria consumes the oxygen to give you energy and if you damage it then the cell starts to malfunction very seriously.”

Contributing to the advancement of liver disease, mitochondrial damage is typically associated with aging and alcohol abuse. However, we now know that even a seemingly innocuous can of soda can contribute to the breakdown of liver health.

Harm Reduction

While it is easy to be disarmed by yet another of soda’s ingredients, there is hope in minimizing any potential toxic and mitochondrial damage from sodium benzoate. A single supplement combining milk thistle and NT Factor acts as a one-two punch to protect the liver. For anybody refusing to completely abandon his or her favorite soft drink, Fatigue Relief Plus marries these two ingredients:

1. Milk Thistle – This herb has been used for centuries to protect liver cells from toxic infiltration. By strengthening the cell wall of hepatocytes (liver cells), milk thistle is able to prevent poisonous substances such as benzene from entering and damaging the cell.

2. NT Factor – Clinically proven to reduce fatigue by up to 40 percent, NT Factor actually repairs damaged mitochondria. Based on Lipid Replacement Technology, this food-based, nutritional supplement strengthens cells on a molecular level. By combining nutrients needed for healthy cell membranes with phosphoglycolipids, NT Factor prevents attacks by free radicals and restores cell membrane health to minimize any damage done by sodium benzoate.

One way to optimize your liver management plan is by thoroughly researching everything you ingest to avoid consuming a potentially harmful liver substance. However, an infrequent bottle of soda won’t hurt anyone. Another approach is to be sensible in your food and beverage intake, make every effort to institute the six healthful lifestyle changes and supplement with Fatigue Relief Plus. With Fatigue Relief Plus, you are supplying your liver with protection on a cellular level, giving it more power to help its cells function optimally – even with the occasional consumption of a soft drink.

References:

Efrati C, et al., Effect of sodium benzoate on blood ammonia response to oral glutamine challenge in cirrhotic patients: a note of caution, The American Journal of Gastroenterology, December 2000.

http://news.independent.co.uk, Caution, Some Soft Drinks May Seriously Harm Your Health, Martin Hickman, Independent News and Media Unlimited, May 2007.

www.associatedcontent.com, Study: Soft Drink Ingredient Sodium Benzoate May Lead to Cirrhosis, Parkinson’s, Griff, May 2007.

www.drweil.com, Too Much Sizzle in Soda?, Andrew Weil, MD, Weil Lifestyle LLC, July 2007.

www.ntfactor.com, Nutritional Therapeutics, Inc., 2007.

www.organicconsumers.org, Soda Ingredients Linked to Cirrhosis and Cancer, Organic Consumers Association, 2007.

www.vision.org, Old Preservative Study Sparks New Media Fizz, vision.org, June 2007.