Patriot Health Digest
The NY Times analyzed “over 60 inches of Subway tuna sandwiches” to determine if the sandwiches had one of the five possible different species of tuna.
The Subway tuna research expands to another city after a lab has discovered no evidence of real tuna DNA within Subway’s tuna sandwiches.
The NY Times paid to have “over 60 inches worth of Subway sandwiches” tested by a lab after a lawsuit in Jan. alleged that there was no real tuna in the company’s ingredients. The Washington Post was also the first to publish the news that two Californian citizens – Nilima Amin and Karen Dhanowa and, issued the suit in a U.S. District Court.
Samples of Subway tuna were purchased from three of their franchises in LA and a lab performed a PCR test to investigate if the tuna had one of five possible tuna species, the NY Times said.
As the news outlet says, the Seafood List published by the FDA defines 15 species that can be called tuna. Subway reports that they use yellowfin and skipjack tuna.
“No amplifiable tuna DNA was inside the sample we got, and so we did not see amplification products from this DNA,” the researcher said. “We cannot identify what this species is.”
A lab spokesperson announced: “There are two possible conclusions. One, it is so heavily processed that we could not identify it. Or we there is nothing there that is tuna.”
When tuna is cooked, its DNA gets denatured – meaning the test results could possibly be inaccurate because of this change, the NY Times added.
In their lawsuit filed in Jan., the plaintiffs say that Subway’s tuna is made “from a mixture of numerous concoctions that are not real tuna, yet have been combined to appear like tuna.” The complaint was made after the plaintiffs had “multiple samples” of Subway tuna brought to independent labs.
Author: Steven Sinclaire
