What health issues are associated with MSG?
Posted by Dolores
Shane M asked:
I’m always seeing commercials for soups and other food products boasting about the lack of MSG in their products. I did a quick Wikipedia search for MSG and only read that it may cause migraines in some people, which doesn’t seem like a big deal. Are there any other health issues associated with MSG intake?
JEWEL
I’m always seeing commercials for soups and other food products boasting about the lack of MSG in their products. I did a quick Wikipedia search for MSG and only read that it may cause migraines in some people, which doesn’t seem like a big deal. Are there any other health issues associated with MSG intake?
JEWEL
February 10th, 2009 at 7:37 am
Hi Shane. Glutamate is an excitatory neurotransmitter that is highly toxic in excess. MSG is a source of Glutamate. A recent study in animals concluded: “GLU (glutamate) is a widely used nutritional subtance that potentially exhibits significant neuronal toxicity.”
I hope this is helpful to you.
Best wishes and good luck.
February 13th, 2009 at 12:06 am
If my memory is correct, the term Chinese Restaurant Syndrome first appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine sometime in the mid to late 1960s. After eating at Chinese restaurants, certain patients complained of headaches, sweating and flushing, paresthesias around the mouth, and sometimes chest pain and heart palpitations. The cause of CRS was attributed to MSG, monosodium glutamate, a flavor enhancer popular in Asian cuisine. At the time they hypothesized that glutamate sensitive synapses in the brain were excited by a heavy dose. I don’t recall if it was in that first paper or later that vitamin B6 was proposed as an antidote.
At any rate, headaches and drowsiness are side-effects of MSG consumption in sensitive individuals.