By: Svetlana Pasarić |
Is citric acid actually carcinogenic? |
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I remember that a few years ago rumors circulated that the citric acid was dangerous for health because it caused cancer.
After that, me and my friends carefully avoided products that contained citric acid.
It was an ordeal, since almost every product today contains it.
After some time it crossed my mind to investigate why citric acid was so dangerous and why it should be avoided.
After a thorough research on the Internet - to my surprise - I did not find a lot of confirmation about the dangers of citric acid.
Instead, I found information about how the rumors about its dangers were wrong.
Even scientists and alternative health experts agree that citric acid is one of the most harmless additives that ever existed.
What is citric acid
Versatile and widespread organic matter, citric acid is a colorless crystalline compound, which belongs to the family of carboxylic acids.
Citric acid is present in almost all tissues of many plants and animals. The highest concentration of citric acid found in lemons and other citrus fruits.
At first, citric acid was obtained from lemon juice. Swiss chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele first got citric acid from lemon in 1784, using the fungus Aspergillus niger.
In our time citric acid is mostly produced by fermentation of sugar cane or molasses in the presence of Aspergillus niger, and sometimes from lemon or pineapple. Thus, citric acid is not a product of unnatural chemistry, contrary to what many think.
Citric acid is widely used in the food industry. You can find it in a wide range of products - in soft drinks, juices, pastries, cheese, spreads, cakes, cookies, ice cream, jams, jellies, soups, ready-made sauces, canned goods, etc.
What health problems can citric acid cause
It is known that citric acid is a local irritant. This means that undiluted citric acid can irritate the skin.
In addition, large amounts of citric acid can cause erosion of tooth enamel.
For the same reason it is not recommended to intake large quantities of lemon juice or other citrus fruit daily, because of high amounts of citric acid.
Does citric acid cause cancer?
Rumors about citric acid causing cancer are not true.
An error allegedly occurred because of the surname of the scientist who discovered the citric acid cycle - Adolf Krebs (Krebs in German means cancer or crab).
Citric acid (E330) is not carcinogenic. If citric acid caused cancer, every cell of our body would be turned into a cancer cell, because citric acid is present in all our cells, next to the DNA.
In contrast, citric acid is considered to be one of the safest additives in the food industry.
To make the story even funnier; it was found that citric acid has anti-cancer properties. It is even used in some alternative cancer treatment methods.
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