Emily Bee, this is all your fault.

 I have numerous blogs that I start and don't finish. This can be for a variety of reasons mostly because I get bored with it or realise its becoming too much of a rant. Occasionally I realise the content may go beyond being a 'Dissappointing opinion' and may result in people wearing hoodies carrying pitchforks and blazing torches outside my house.
This blog falls into this category but I read something today that made me think the blog needed adding to and I would publish it anyway.
Tin hat on.

Part One

For the two other people who read this blog, you will know that Emily Bee is often kind enough to comment and on the last two blogs mentioned honey and pregnancy. I first encountered this issue quite a while ago but have never been brave enough to do a blog on it before now. However because of Emily I have added it to my list and I might as well do a blog on it and get it out the way


Last year I met a couple at a Farmers Market who had a young baby with them. They tried the honey, honeycomb etc and I half jokingly asked if the little one wanted a little bit of honey but the Mum said you shouldn't give honey to a baby under a year.
I was a bit surprised as I had never heard of this and if anything had a dim recollection of Mums dipping dummies in honey as a pacifier.
Again this is an issue of little relevance to me as a bee keeper but I thought  if I'm selling honey, its something I need to know about so I settled down for a few hours Googling to find something specific or some scientific data.
And found absolutely nothing.

I started off with 'Why can't babies eat honey' and there was nothing.
There were several references to botulism, such as:-

Honey shouldn't be given to a child under one as there is a small risk that it can contain spores of the Clostridium botulinum bacterium which could cause infant botulism. Symptoms may include constipation, listlessness and lack of appetite.

So I then had a look for botulism and found an NHS page about it which said:-

infant botulism can occur when a baby ingests spores of the C. botulinum bacteria in contaminated soil or food, such as honey

and,

However, you should avoid giving honey to babies less than 12 months old because it has been known to contain C. botulinum spores.

OK, good enough for me. If the NHS say so that's fine.
However it also said:-

There were only 16 cases of infant botulism in England and Wales between 1975 and 2013, although 10 of these occurred from 2007 onwards. None of the 16 cases were fatal.

So in 38 years fortunately there hasn't been a single infant fatality. I thought I would have another look for some more information and I did find something more authoritative, more comprehensive than mere scientific evidence.
An article in The Daily Mail.

The headline screamed
Babies left fighting for their lives after getting botulism 'from eating honey'  
It went on to say:-

Two British babies have contracted a rare life-threatening disease triggered by eating honey.The boys, aged three months and five months, had to be put on life-support machines suffering from infant botulism.Both had been feeding badly and showed typical symptoms – a floppy head, drooping eyelids and constipation. They were cured only after medication costing £50,000 a dose was flown in from America.The incidents, confirmed last week, have prompted public health chiefs to warn that infants under one should not be given honey.

So here it was, apparently the case that prompted the NHS to warn about babies having honey. Now when anybody asks me about it I can show them the NHS stuff and Daily Mail article.

It went on:-

The younger boy had eaten honey, while the older one had been given a homoeopathic treatment that may have contained honey, which can carry the potentially deadly bacteria.

'a homoeopathic treatment that may have contained honey' - Mmmmmmm.
Much later in the article it says

He had taken the homoeopathic remedy before becoming ill, though tests on it showed no trace of botulism

 and,

His mother admitted giving him honey at home, though tests on what was left in the jar also failed to detect the botulism bacteria. 

 So, one of the boys had taken a homoeopathic remedy which didn't contain honey nor any trace of botulism, and the other had honey that also had no trace of botulism in it.

To remind you the headline said
'from eating honey' , 
the article then goes on to say  

Two British babies have contracted a rare life-threatening disease triggered by eating honey. 

yet the same article said only one of the boys had eaten honey and there was no trace  of botulism in the homeopathic remedy or honey.
Could this be the first example for 38 years of sloppy journalism?

The article then takes a predictable turn by bringing in AN EXPERT.  Except where the BBC are desperately trying to be balanced, most experts are there just to support the drift of the article - I have never seen something like 'an expert in XXX said 'sorry you're article is badly researched, badly written and misleading. You're just trying to generate web traffic to your site aren't you|?'
If they do they know they will never be asked again so its easier yo go with the flow and collect the fame and cheque.

The expert starts off by saying 'I am concerned that not enough mothers and women know about infant botulism and what can cause it. Children under 12 months should not be fed honey. 
She then goes on to say 'They don’t need homeopathic preparations or herbal tea. They should also be kept away from dust and soil .....’ So far so-so then things go a bit weird when she finishes with ',,,,and pet terrapins'

'Pet terrapins'?  So the countries favourite flushable pet can carry botulism?Surely the country needs to know the perils of this reptile. What does the NHS have to say?
I searched the net to find more of the perils of this plague carrying reptile. Nothing.
Perhaps its a conspiracy by the multi million pound terrapin industry to bury bad news but I found nothing.
I looked at several pet sites selling terrapins hoping to see 'WARNING - terrapins spread botulism that could result in the importation of expensive medication and a hysterical article in the Daily Mail', but no.
I did find a series of horribly detailed medical reports on a previous case of two children in Ireland who contracted botulism which was traced to the their parents terrapin tank.  [the parents didn't live in the tank, the tank belonged to their parents and it had terrapins in it]. No mention of honey.
The children survived.

I expect to be asked in an accusatory way, 'Would you give honey to a baby?' Would you take the risk' 
Don't know' would be the reply, 'as far as I know there hasn't been a fatal case of botulism in 38 years. Also, why would I - its a treat food for adults that has well known medical benefits. If parents are so concerned about what their children are fed, why are there so many kids in McDonalds eating Chicken McNuggets or drinking a Starbucks coffee with 20-25 tea spoons of sugar in it,?'
As regards the 'risk', there hasn't been a fatality in 38 years and I expect the response will be 'it might happen one day'. It might and equally one day I might be hit on the head by a meteorite. It hasn't happened in the last 38 years but it might do.

 
Part Two
Today I found an article in the Telegraph with the headline

Chemical found in babies' dummies and condoms 'probably causes cancer'

The article describes how the World Health Organisation has said that  MBT - full name 2-mercaptobenzothiazole, a chemical that is found in condoms and babies' dummies "probably causes cancer", according to world health chiefs, who ranked it alongside red meat as a possible carcinogen.
The headline is accompanied by a picture of a dummy in a babies mouth but no picture of a condom or a .............

Expert No 1 says

the small amounts of MBT in everyday products were not likely to be harmful. 

It doesn't quantify the risk although it might be there hasn't been a case in say, 38 years. In any event I don't expect people would get past the headline with the perfect panic scare headline including babies, condoms and cancer.

Expert No 2 says

"We need the regulatory system to work faster to protect us," he told the newspaper. "People would be right to be concerned about this, and to ask retailers whether this chemical is present in products that they have bought."

In the Daily Mail article about botulism it said

Social networking forums Mumsnet and Netmums have scores of queries from new mothers asking if honey is safe for babies 

I couldn't find anything about terrapins or MBT on Mumsnet or Netmums.

As for the cancerous condoms [what a Daily Mail headline that would be] and dummies, I look forward to health warnings printed on packets, NHS web sites etc.

We seem to get some sort of weird enjoyment in having the crap scared out of us by sordid little rags like the Mail. There is a website here with a list of the things the Daily Mail has claimed will give us cancer. 
Perhaps purple track suited loon David Icke was right when he said the world was being controlled by reptiles from the 4th dimension controlling humans by broadcasts from the Moon.