Washington Post Targets Lack of Food Additive Scrutiny
Discussing the expedited approval process for food additives that took effect
17 years ago, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Deputy Commissioner
for Food Michael Taylor recently told Washington Post reporter Kimberly
Kindy that the agency does not have “the information to vouch for the safety
of many of these chemicals.” According to the August 17, 2014, article, the
number of additives in the food supply has increased to 9,000 from 800 over
a 50-year span, in part because a voluntary certification system dependent
on industry safety data has eclipsed FDA’s independent review process.
Under the Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) scheme, companies need
only submit a summary of their safety research to FDA, shortening time to
approval even for new and novel food additives.
In particular, the Post highlights how a mycoprotein marketed as “Quorn”
achieved GRAS status despite one undisclosed study allegedly showing
that 5 percent of test subjects experienced an adverse reaction after
consuming the meat substitute. The article further claims that the voluntary
process—which does not require FDA sign-off—often fails to account for the
cumulative effects of food additives such as caffeine and carrageenan that
may be considered GRAS in smaller amounts but problematic at the levels
currently consumed. “We aren’t saying we have a public health crisis. But we
do have questions about whether we can do what people expect of us,” Taylor
concluded. “We do not know the volume of particular chemicals that are
going into the food supply so we can diagnose trends. We do not know what
is going on post-market.”
Issue 535
