US Department of Health and Human Services

December 6, 2024

Spotlight on cancer-causing food additive as advocates demand FDA ban Red Dye 3

By Shannon Kelleher

In the waning days of the Biden administration, a long-fought battle over a cancer-causing food additive is again in the spotlight as consumer advocacy groups and lawmakers demand federal regulators ban Red Dye No. 3, a chemical used to give popular candies, foods and drinks their cherry-red colors.

The issue took center stage Thursday at a US Senate hearing where lawmakers grilled Jim Jones, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) deputy commissioner for human foods, over the issue.

“Red 3 has been known to cause cancer in cosmetics but we still allow it to be put in our food. I don’t understand that,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville said in the hearing. “If we know something is deadly for anybody that ingests it how do we continue to just study that and not say hey, enough is enough?”

Industry studies linked Red Dye 3 to cancer in rodents more than 30 years ago, and public health groups have spent years lobbying food companies and regulators to get the chemical out of foods.

Two years ago, two dozen organizations and scientists submitted a petition to the FDA demanding a ban, citing a 1990 FDA conclusion that the chemical causes cancer when fed to rats.

Last month, 23 members of Congress sent a letter to the FDA also calling for a ban, saying the FDA “should act quickly to protect the nation’s youth from this harmful dye.” The letter noted Red Dye 3 has been banned or mostly banned in Europe, Australia and New Zealand and California has a ban on the dye in food taking effect in 2027.

“Thirty-four years of inaction is far too long,” the letter states.

In Thursday’s hearing, Jones said the agency was “hopeful” it would “be acting on that petition” in the “next few weeks.”

It is “long past time,” for the FDA to ban the dye, US Rep. Frank Pallone said in a Dec. 5 letter to the FDA. “With the holiday season in full swing where sweet treats are abundant, it is frightening that this chemical remains hidden in these foods that we and our children are eating.”

November 22, 2024

Friend or foe? Environmental advocates eye Kennedy nomination warily

By Shannon Kelleher

In the wake of last week’s announcement that President-elect Donald Trump has nominated Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to head the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), some leading environmental and public health advocates say they’ve found themselves in a “difficult” position.

On the one hand, Kennedy is a lifelong environmental advocate himself and is pushing a platform called “Make America Healthy Again” (MAHA), which sets an agenda strikingly similar to those of many groups on the political left – “prioritizing regenerative agriculture, preserving natural habitats, and eliminating toxins from our food, water and air.”

But on the other, Kennedy’s alignment with Trump – who touts his intention to roll back regulations and undo many hard-fought consumer protections – and Kennedy’s controversial views on certain health-related issues, have left leading environmental health groups unclear on whether he should be seen as friend or foe.

Kennedy has argued for tighter US pesticide regulations and has spoken out against glyphosate, the main ingredient in the popular weedkiller Roundup that has been classified as a probable carcinogen by a major international cancer research group. He has also been sharply critical of regulators for failing to protect kids from harmful additives in food.

He rails against cozy connections between big business and the regulatory agencies that are supposed to oversee them, and vows to work to eliminate conflicts of interest in the agencies he would oversee, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and others.

“I can get the corruption out of the agencies,” said Kennedy in a recent interview. “It’s what I’ve been doing for 40 years. Once [the regulatory agencies] are not corrupt, once Americans are getting good science and are allowed to make their own choices, they’re going to get a lot healthier.”

Kennedy has a background as an environmental lawyer with a decades-long track record of fighting for green issues – he was once named one of Time magazine’s “Heroes for the Planet” for his work restoring the Hudson River, he founded the clean water advocacy group Waterkeeper Alliance, and he previously served as senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

But critics point out that Kennedy has no medical training and has been accused of peddling baseless conspiracy theories and making claims not supported by science.

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June 6, 2024

Lawsuit alleges company illegally discharged cancer-causing TCE for decades

By Shannon Kelleher and Carey Gillam

A Mississippi auto parts company illegally dumped toxic waste for more than 50 years, poisoning workers and sparking a cluster of cancer cases, according to a lawsuit filed this week by a group of former employees.

The lawsuit, filed June 4 in the US District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi, names EnPro Industries and multiple other corporate entities as defendants in the case, alleging they participated in illegally discharging trichloroethylene (TCE) into the environment, contaminating soil, air and groundwater, and knowingly exposing workers to the cancer-causing chemical.

“This greedy company cheated to cut costs at the expense of human health and risking countless lives,” Nick Rowley, co-founder of the national public interest law firm Trial Lawyers for Justice, said in a press release. “The scope and scale of harms and losses caused by this wrongdoing is devastating.”

TCE is a clear, colorless liquid that is used as a degreasing solvent and dry cleaning agent, among other uses. It is considered a human carcinogen by the US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The chemical is also known to damage the heart, liver, kidneys, and many other organs in the human body. It can also break down into other chemicals known to cause cancer in humans, including vinyl chloride. As well, a recent study found “circumstantial” evidence linking TCE to the doubling of global Parkinson’s disease diagnoses over the past 30 years

TCE can be found in the drinking water of 19 million people, according to the Environmental Working Group.

The EPA has recently proposed banning all uses of TCE, but the chemical industry is fighting the move. The American Chemistry Council asserts TCE is valuable for many industrial uses.