Take care of your liver

When I was in college, I competed in a peanut eating contest: how many peanuts could someone eat in one minute. For a short time, I held the record by simply eating whole peanuts without removing the shells.  Eventually, someone else won by the same trick.

Years later, I learned that this is a bad idea, since peanut shell often carry aflatoxin from Aspergillus mold. Aflatoxin is hepatotoxic and can cause liver cancer.

Two of the most familiar threats to a healthy liver are viral hepatitis and alcoholism. But an increasing source of liver damage is herbal and dietary supplements that people imagine are health foods.

 

“These herbal and dietary supplements include ashwagandha, turmeric, and green tea extract. Researchers note that green tea extract is often marketed as preventing liver disease.

“This latest review cites research from the US Acute Liver Failure Study Group that found that acute liver failure caused by herbal and dietary supplements rose from 9.7% from 1998-2007 to 22% in 2008-2018.

“A previous study found that as many as 15 million Americans take one of six herbal supplements that may be potentially toxic to the liver.”

Sassafras tea contains safrole, a chemical that causes liver cancer in laboratory animals. Acetaminophen, marketed as Tylenol, is a known hepatotoxin. As any toxicologist will tell you, the dose makes the poison. But I’ll just avoid these herbal and dietary supplements. YMMV.

https://www.michiganmedicine.org/health-lab/evolving-causes-diagnosis-drug-induced-liver-injury

 

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