The US Food and Drug Administration This week has established maximum levels for lead in baby food such as fruit and vegetables by train Toxic metal which causes development and neurological problems.
The agency has published final guidelines that it estimated could reduce the exposure to lead in baby processed for babies by around 20% to 30%. The limits are voluntary, not compulsory, for food manufacturers, but they allow the FDA to take application measures if food exceeds levels.
This is part of the continuous FDA efforts to “reduce food exposure to contaminants, including lead, in food as low as possible over time, while maintaining access to nutritious foods,” the agency said in a press release.
Consumer defenders, who have long sought lead limits in children's food, praised the advice offered for the first time two years ago, but said that it was not far enough.
“The actions of the FDA today are a step forward and will help protect children,” said Thomas Galligan, a scientist from the Center for Science in the Public Interest. “However, the agency took too long to act and ignored the important public contributions that could have strengthened these standards.”
The new lead limits for children under the age of 2 do not cover cereal -based snacks such as puffs and dentition cookies, which certain research has shown contain higher lead levels. And they do not limit other metals such as cadmium that have been detected in baby foods.
The FDA's announcement comes a week after A new Californian law Taken effect which requires baby food manufacturers selling products to California to provide a QR code on their packaging to bring consumers to the results of monthly tests for the presence in their product of four heavy metals: lead, mercury, arsenic and cadmium.
The change, required by a law adopted by the California Legislative Assembly in 2023, will affect consumers nationally. Because companies are unlikely to create separate packaging for the Californian market, QR codes are likely to belong to the products sold across the country, and consumers will be able to see heavy metal concentrations.
Although companies are required to start printing new packaging and publication of the results of the products made from January, it can take time to the products to hit the shelves of the grocery store.
The law was inspired by a 2021 Investigation of Congress This has found dangerously high levels of heavy metals in packaged foods sold for babies and toddlers. Foods for babies and their ingredients had up to 91 times the level of the arsenic, up to 177 times the lead level, up to 69 times the level of cadmium, and up to five times the level of mercury that the United States allows to be present in bottled water or drinking water, The investigation revealed.
There is no secure level of lead exposure for children, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention American. Metal causes “well -documented health effects”, including damage to the brain and nervous system and slows growth and development. However, lead occurs naturally in certain foods and comes from pollutants in the air, water and soil, which may make it impossible to eliminate entirely.
The FDA advice set a lead limit of 10 parts per billion for fruits, most vegetables, grains and mixtures of meat, yogurts, nurseries and puddings and monomer meats. It sets a limit of 20 parts per billion for root vegetables with unique ingredients and for cereals for dry infants. Advice cover the packed processed foods sold in jars, pockets, baths or boxes.
Jaclyn Bowen, Executive Director of Clean Label Project, an organization that certifies baby foods as having low levels of toxic substances, said consumers can use new FDA advice in tandem with the new Californian law: the FDA, she said, provided parents with a “difficult and rapid number” to consider a benchmark in the search for new monthly results.
But Brian Ronholm, director of food policy for consumer reports, qualified the limits of the FDA “practically devoid of meaning because they are more based on the feasibility of the industry and not on what would best protect public health”. A product with a level of lead of 10 parts per billion is “still too high for baby food. What we have heard of many of these manufacturers is that they test well below this number. ”
The new FDA advice occurs more than a year after Cinnamon puree pockets with apple According to the CDC.
The lead levels detected in these products were more than 2,000 times higher than the maximum of the FDA. Officials have stressed that the agency does not need advice to take measures on food that violates the law.
Aleccia writes for the Associated Press. The golden reports for the Times early childhood education initiative, focusing on the learning and development of California children from birth to the age of 5. For more information on the initiative and its philanthropic donors, go to latimes.com/earlyyed.
