Thanks to HHS Secretary Kennedy, Help Is on the Way.
Recent laboratory tests of military meals, and Meals Ready to Eat (MREs), revealed high levels of pesticides, heavy metals, and livestock drug residues within the food. America’s troops deserve better. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is making sure that happens.
The tests examined 40 types of food at sixteen military base cafeterias and twenty-four MREs. Moms Across America, Children’s Health Defense Military Chapter, and Centner Academy commissioned the tests via an independent lab. The results should concern all Americans.
Zen Honeycutt, founder of Moms Across America, explained that previous studies of school lunches and fast food had discovered alarming levels of contaminants in some samples. These results, coupled with reports that China and Russia do not use GMO products in their military meals, prompted the independent tests.
Honeycutt emphasized that the purpose of the inquiry was to improve the quality of food for both schoolchildren and troops, as a national security priority. She stressed that the food samples all came from Biden-era production, but that these problems have developed over many administrations.
Why independent tests?
It does not appear that the military tests its food supplies for chemical adulteration, so the private entities undertook the task. The toxins they found in military meals varied by sample, but all samples contained pesticide residues, with some showing as many as 15-26 different residues in a single item.
All samples also contained toxic heavy metals arsenic, cadmium, lead, mercury, and aluminum, with some contaminated at levels 430%-17,300% above EPA drinking water guidelines. The weedkiller glyphosate was detected in 95% of samples. Five different veterinary drugs were found, which suggested “….likely contamination from imported meat and an urgency for sourcing American, regenerative, and organically raised meat for military meals. Four out of five of the veterinary drugs detected are made in China.”
In a press release issued by Moms Across America and posted on its website on February 4, Honeycutt questioned whether widespread contamination of military meals is evidence of “silent chemical warfare” being funded with U.S. taxpayer dollars, leading to trillions of dollars of healthcare costs. The solution Honeycutt proposed is “regenerative, organic agriculture that rebuilds mineral-rich soil, producing naturally nutrient-dense food without toxic contamination or synthetic additives,” she wrote.
Secretary Kennedy is already on the case. He has raised awareness about the food contamination identified in the independent study and is in the process of changing what troops are served at bases.
Along with the MAHA movement he helped spawn, Kennedy is also well-aware that American entrepreneurs can solve these threats to our nation’s health. Nutrient-dense MREs are already produced in the U.S., but domestic farm production of sufficient organic or regenerative commodities to meet growing demand is lagging.
On February 11, flanked by USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins at a press conference celebrating the implementation of last month’s new dietary guidelines, Secretary Kennedy commented on food served at U.S. military bases and changes he’s making.
“The food was so bad on these bases, the troops weren’t eating it,” Kennedy said. “50% of it was being thrown out – and now there’s lines around the block where people are fighting to get in. The troops were going and buying their meals from fast food joints and spending their hard-earned, meager military paycheck on fast food. Now they’re fighting to get in to eat real food. And it’s all fresh, there’s no freezing.”
In its press release, Moms Across America states that the U.S. military serves 1.5 billion meals and 37 million MREs to active-duty service members each year. To this can be added veterans and VA hospitals. But, as Honeycutt explains, healthy meals free of Chinese-manufactured chemicals should also be provided to the nation’s schoolchildren, hospital patients, prison inmates, SNAP beneficiaries, and grocery store shoppers.
