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7:45am -- Tainted Tortillas |
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Written by ABQNews Staff
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last updated Monday, March 13, 2006, at 13:33:41
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Tortillas made with corn contaminated with a certain mold probably resulted in birth defects in children born to women along the border.
According to a scientific study published by the Environmental Health Perspectives journal, the study began in the 1990s after six babies were born with partial or missing brains in a six-week period, reported the El Paso Times today.
The study focused on women in U.S. border counties, including El Paso. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provided money for the study after the number of neural tube defects among Mexican-American women doubled between 1990 and 1991, experts said.
The study published in the February issue of the journal is titled "Exposure to Fumonisins and the Occurrence of Neural Tube Defects along the Texas-Mexico Border."
The study found that pregnant women who ate 300 to 400 tortillas a month during the first trimester had more than twice the risk of giving birth to infants with these kinds of defects than did women who ate fewer than 100 tortillas.
Consumers no longer have to worry about the tortillas they eat because the federal Food and Drug Administration came out with guidelines for acceptable levels of the toxin in food products.
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