Word: cornstarch
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Role-playing programs give them a crash course. At Hunterdon, students' faces are instantly aged with cornstarch and makeup. Next the disabilities are laid on: yellow goggles smeared with Vaseline distort vision, wax plugs dampen hearing, gloves and splints cripple fingers, and peas inside shoes impair walking. Then the ersatz invalids are asked to perform common tasks: purchasing medication at the pharmacy, undressing for X rays, filling out a Medicare form and, most humiliating, using the bathroom...
Some firms argue that degradable, not recycled, plastics are a better solution to the waste problem. Archer Daniels Midland claims to have invented a kind of cornstarch additive that makes plastics totally disintegrate when exposed to soil, water or sunlight; currently, no more than 0.5% of all U.S. plastic products are degradable. But for the process to work, a certain amount of moisture must be present in the soil, and critics argue that landfills are not always moist enough for the plastic to break down. Even some trash that deteriorates can take years to do so. Says Jeanne Wirka...
...disintegrated under sunlight, unavailable at the bottom of landfills. Others came apart after contact with water, causing supermarket executives to shudder at the thought of what would happen to the groceries in a plastic shopping bag containing a leaky milk bottle. But now there is a method of adding cornstarch to some plastics. Bacteria eat the starch, causing the plastic to fall apart into pieces that can be ingested by microorganisms. Result: the plastic disintegrates in four to seven years...
...caller named stores in Houston and Orlando, where he said he placed capsules laced with cyanide or rat poison. Investigators initially found capsules spiked with sugar and cornstarch. The adulteration was easily detected. The man had crudely cut into the plastic blisters encasing the capsules. Said SmithKline's James Russo: "We're not talking about someone with exquisite skill for hiding what he is doing...
Inexpensive Psychiatry. Argo representatives say that their laundry product contains nothing but cornstarch, a common thickener for soups and desserts. (They also say the starch-eating habit is "rare.") According to medical opinion, eating large amounts of laundry starch often brings on anemia by blocking the body's absorption of iron. Some doctors state that overeating laundry starch may also cause a deficiency of folic acid, which in pregnant women may lead to premature births or bleeding near delivery time...