ABSTRACT
Somewhere between the litany from regulatory agencies and others that “North America has the safest food supply in the world’’ and the almost daily media bombardment about some deadly neurotoxicant, teratogen, carcinogen, and so on, of the week in food lies the actual truth of the matter. Mention of the word “chemical” conjures images of devastating diseases, cancers, and birth defects, giving rise to the syndrome chemophobia, a fear of all chemicals. As stated some time ago by David Bradley, “There is nothing like a good dose of media exposure to turn people off a healthy food” (1). He was referring to the controversy of daminozide (Alar™) in apples. The public is well aware that it is exposed involuntarily to a myriad of man-made chemicals in air, water, and food that are present accidentally or put there for a purpose.
