By Anna El-Zein and John Johnson III Sesame is the ninth Major Food Allergen with the passage of the Food Allergy Safety, Treatment, Education, and Research Act (FASTER) Act on April 23, 2021. Starting on January 1, 2023, any food “introduced or delivered for introduction into interstate commerce” must appropriately declare the presence of “sesame” as a major food allergen. However, the FASTER Act is more than just updating food labels; it also implicates supplier controls, Food Safety or HACCP Plans, sanitation practices and other procedures. With the compliance deadline looming, companies must start thinking about how FASTER affects their procedures sooner rather than later. Under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA), a packaged food is misbranded if the label fails to declare the presence of a major allergen, either in the ingredient list or in a “contains” statement. With the addition of sesame to the “Big 8,”…
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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued draft guidance "encouraging food manufacturers to voluntarily declare sesame in the ingredient list on food labels." The guidance notes that "sesame can, in some circumstances (such as when ground and used in a spice blend), be declared in an ingredient statement as simply 'spice' or 'flavor,' so its presence may not be obvious to consumers." While FDA has not required sesame to be labeled, "we recommend that manufacturers, as a voluntary matter, clearly declare sesame in the ingredient list when it is used in foods as a 'flavor' or 'spice' in a parenthetical following the spice or flavor, such as 'spice (sesame),' 'spices (including sesame),' 'flavor (sesame),' or 'flavors (including sesame).' If a term is used for a food that is or contains sesame, such as tahini, we recommend that sesame be included in a parenthesis, e.g. 'tahini (sesame)' in the…
Allergen labeling grabbed headlines in the United Kingdom in 2019 as the country faced pressure from consumers concerned that prepackaged foods lacked mandated ingredient disclosures. Following the 2016 death of a teenager who consumed a premade sandwich packaged without notification of potential exposure to sesame, the U.K. Food Standards Agency launched a public consultation that resulted in the announcement of "Natasha's Law." Under the law, which will take effect in October 2021, restaurants and other food-service entities will be required to provide a full listing of ingredients on prepackaged food. In the United States, sesame is not an allergen that requires labeling, although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requested comments on the allergy's prevalence and severity in 2018. The New York Times called current U.S. regulations incomplete in January, and an August NPR article compared the two systems and found awareness of allergies in the United States lacking.…
NPR has published a writer's comparison of his experiences eating at restaurants in the United States and the United Kingdom while living with a peanut allergy. "Restaurants in the United Kingdom are generally far more vigilant, in this regard, than restaurants in the United States," the author observes. He recounts his experience being turned away from a U.K. restaurant after answering the server's question about food allergies by receiving a card explaining that the restaurant does "not operate in a surgical environment" and therefore could not guarantee that any of its menu items did not contain peanuts. "In America, the onus typically falls more on diners themselves," the author notes. "It's not routine, as it is in England, for servers to ask their customers proactively." The writer credits coverage of a U.K. teenager's death after eating a sandwich from Pret A Manger that was not labeled as containing sesame for…
Illinois has passed a law requiring businesses to indicate on food labels whether a product contains sesame. The amended law deems a food misbranded if "it contains sesame, is offered for sale in package form but not for immediate consumption, and the label does not include sesame." The state representative who sponsored the legislation told the NPR affiliate that his daughter is allergic to sesame and has received incorrect answers when inquiring about the ingredient at restaurants. “If they see us do it, the hope is that everyone does it,” he reportedly told WILL. “I hope that the [U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)] and other states will follow suit." FDA and the U.K. Food Standards Agency have opened investigations into the prevalence of sesame as an allergen in prepared food products, while Canada, the European Union, Australia and Israel have reportedly enacted regulations requiring sesame labeling.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has requested comments on "the prevalence and severity of sesame allergies in the United States and the prevalence of sesame-containing foods sold in the United States that are not required to disclose sesame as an ingredient." The announcement cites a 2014 petition submitted by the Center for Science in the Public Interest requesting a "rule to require that sesame seeds and sesame products be regulated in a manner similar to the manner in which major food allergens are regulated."
