In one week's time the federal Government, in collusion with Labor State Health Ministers, will rubber stamp our country's Food Standards agency's, FSANZ, 'suggestion' that all Australian and New Zealand bread be forced to contain a synthetic drug - manufactured Folic Acid.

FSANZ's own data suggests that this MIGHT benefit some 26 Australian women a year who could possibly undergo a pregnancy affected by an NTD (Neural Tube Defect - more commonly seen as Spina Bifida but can also result in brain defects causing fatalities in infancy). FSANZ's data also shows that this is likely to cost bread consumers around $100 million each year after the legislation is enforced (by 2008 if the Minsterial Council agrees when they meet on Oct 25)

As for the other 16 million consumers of bread in Australia it will not give any benefit at all! Quite frankly I'd rather put the extra 2 - 5 cents per loaf this legislation will cost me into health education and medical research and cures for all health disorders than into the bread manufacturers pockets (what could an extra $100 million every year do for our nation's health?)

Tell your local health minister you don't want this compulsory legislation to corrupt the food you eat every day, and do it QUICK! - before it is too late and you get a daily dose of Folic Acid along with your daily dose of Thiamin in your bread (the Thiamin has been there for 15 years to ensure less Alcoholics get Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome - do your own research!)

'drain

Thanks for the info. Another problem with folic acid supplements is that it can be taken up in place of vitamin B12 in people with pernicious anemia causing nerve damage.

I have a personal problem with folate/folic acid it will increase the proliferation of my leukaemic blood cells.

OK email to the Qld health minister coming up.

Good Luck Steve,

don't let them fob you off with the bumph my WA Health Dept spouted when i brought it up with them.

They claim a $125 million dollar a year 'benefit' to the nation from reduced health costs and 'added' lifetime earnings of non-NTD children born following this legislation (resulting from just 21 terminations and 5 live births an average of $5 million a year per child - pure BS!)

The claim that up to 49 pregnancies a year will benefit from this legislation is more 'smoke and mirrors' as such a figure will undoubtedly be in part affected by the current voluntary folate fortifications and supplement takings of educated members of our population and is not as they claim the result of mandatory legislation.

On a slightly diferent matter you might find the following interesting reading?
http://thebraindrain.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!1A8604E1D0140DD1!133.entry

Cheers, and GL with the leukaemia.

Brainy... welcome to OLO.. haven't seen anything from you b4.

(just checked the user list.. you have done a bit)

Anyway.. please join us in many other issues that we are grappling with.

How do they work out the $100,000,000 cost of adding the folate to bread ?
cheers

Thanks for the welcome Bo' (Yesterday was my first day.I do like to contibute where I have an opinion (which I hope is usually based in strong fact ; ) )

The 100 Mill is my calculation but based upon FSANZ's own data supplied on their website in discussing the Folic Acid fortification of bread 'proposal'. It comes from:

Total Australian bread flour production (i.e. non-export) in 2002, 958 000 tonnes and increasing annually (so near as dammit 1 billion kilos post 2002).
Ave weight of a loaf ~ 700g - of which some is water and various other junk, so roughly 500g of breadflour in one loaf.
Therefore close to 2 billion loaves (equivalent*)of bread produced each year.
Est. cost increase of bread due to cost of fortification, monitoring, conversion of plant etc. to producers: 1 - 2 % of the price of a loaf (again - FSANZ and Access Economics's data)
Price of bread to consumer: between $1.80 and $3.80 per loaf, say an ave. ~ $2.50
So cost to consumer equals:

1 - 2 % of $2.50 per loaf x 2 billion loaves per year =

50 - 100 Million Dollars!

Since Access Economics can claim a $5 million 'saving' per year per NTD pregnancy I felt justified in claiming the higher figure as consumer cost. Access Economics produced a report claiming to show a 'Cost Benefit Analysis' of this legislation which made a very slight passing reference to the increase of the bread price to consumers but completely passed it off in their final 'calculations' (as they did their costs in producing the report and the FSANZ's cost of over 4 years preparation for this Standards Amendment for the bread we all eat daily).

* breadflour is also used to make buns, rolls, muffins and the like but in general the purchase cost is higher per kilo of flour for these items than it is for a loaf, so my figure should work out at the low end of the scale as the extra cost to consumers is a percentage figure of the purchase price!

P.S. "Brainy" as a nick night imply some level of superiority on my part to some people, while "Drainy" could similarly falsely imply a certain 'sewer level mentality' (ok so that might not be entirley false! ; ) )

Call me B D ! : ) (rhymes with Speedy)