Happy Friday, and welcome to Food Fix! It’s been such a busy week in food world — everyone I talked to was swamped. In the past couple of days, the FDA proposed front-of-pack nutrition labels for the first time and banned Red Dye No. 3 after decades of controversy. An influential government panel found that even moderate drinking carries health risks. The TTB — the federal agency which regulates alcohol, tobacco, firearms and ammunition — issued a first-ever proposal to put nutrition information on alcohol containers.
Stepping back, it sort of feels like the Biden administration was using one of those t-shirt guns to fling long stuck federal regulations out the door, perhaps assuming that the incoming Trump administration wouldn’t act on any of these items. Today, though, we’re going to mostly focus on Red 3.
Alright, let’s get to it –
Helena
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FDA finally bans Red Dye No. 3. Basically no one is impressed.
The FDA on Wednesday revoked its long-standing approval for Red Dye No. 3 — a synthetic coloring agent still used in scores of food products — a full 35 years after the agency banned it from cosmetics over cancer concerns.
Consumer groups cheered the move, though they all argued it was long overdue. To put this in context: The FDA had first said it would move toward banning Red 3 from food when I was in preschool. I now have a kid in preschool. By the time this ban kicks in, my kid will be in first grade.
Food industry groups weren’t exactly pleased with the final decision, but largely accepted it. Consumers, though, were left asking: What on earth took so long? Is this some kind of joke?
The most generous explanation here is that FDA just wasn’t very concerned about the potential health impact of Red 3 and, amid limited resources, didn’t ever prioritize pulling it. It’s true that there are studies showing very high levels of the dye can cause cancer in male rats — we actually knew this in the 1980s — but apparently this mechanism doesn’t apply to humans. (If you want to nerd out on this, go read researcher Kevin Klatt.) Here’s the rub, though: Federal law says FDA can’t authorize additives or colors that have been shown to induce cancer in humans or animals, under what’s known as the Delaney Clause.
This is a case where U.S. regulators have determined there isn’t much of a risk to humans, but it kind of doesn’t matter: Federal law essentially mandates that Red 3 can’t be on the market — and it shouldn’t have been on the market for decades. (Plenty of other countries don’t allow it or strictly limit it. In the EU, for example, you can only use it in cocktail cherries.)
Actually, California did this: Some have tried to argue that FDA’s ban this week shows the agency is working. The FDA re-evaluated a food chemical and took action — the federal process works! This completely ignores the fact that FDA had to be dragged into reconsidering Red 3 because California banned it (along with a handful of other additives) back in 2023. At the time, FDA said it would take another look at Red 3 — conveniently, a petition to ban the substance had already been submitted by consumer groups back in 2022.
There’s also an army of wellness influencers online and on Fox News claiming that this ban is all because of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Donald Trump’s incoming pick to lead HHS, which has broad authority over the health care system and also sits atop FDA.
As I wrote last week: It’s true that the recent online rage over synthetic food dyes gives FDA political cover for this move, but the wheels have been turning on this for a while. The credit goes not to RFK Jr. but state lawmaker Jesse Gabriel, who spearheaded the ban in California (and maybe Gov. Gavin Newsom for signing the bill). I do think advocates for a crackdown on food additives feel they have the wind at their backs, however, and the “Make America Healthy Again” movement is a significant part of that momentum. Newsom just recently issued an executive order calling for more action on additives and ultra-processed foods in California — a sign the Golden State intends to keep leading on this stuff, even if Washington gets more in the game.
FDA looks bad: Instead of this being seen as a consumer or public health win, it’s sort of backfiring and inviting more people into the absurd reality of just how long it takes for FDA to do just about anything. (If you’ve been around here a while, you know that I have been writing about this for a long time, in some ways my whole career has been tracking FDA’s glacial pace. Back in 2022, I wrote a big piece at Politico that really put a lot of this together).
The whole Red 3 saga also feeds perfectly into the bubbling narrative on the right that these health agencies can’t be trusted. When the average consumer learns about this — even with the nuance that the cancer concerns stem from rats not humans, something that was included in much of the press coverage — you still see quite a bit of resentment.
“It’s about damn time,” read the top meme response on People Magazine’s Instagram post on the Red 3 ban. “Oh wow they actually did something positive for the health of our country,” replied another. “FINALLY.”
“It’s just a start. Let’s keep going please.”
This is just a sampling of the responses I saw online. There was rage, humor, mockery and underneath it all was legitimate frustration. It seems clear the feds aren’t doing enough to keep chemicals of concern out of the food supply, and it feels bad. Yanking Red 3 probably won’t make people much healthier — it’s just one small ingredient in a big food system. Food companies have already been quietly moving away from using it, perhaps seeing the writing on the wall. Regardless, this is all a black eye for the FDA.
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What I’m reading
FTC sues PepsiCo, alleging it forced up prices for soft drinks (Wall Street Journal). “The Federal Trade Commission on Friday sued PepsiCo, alleging the beverage company forced many consumers to pay higher prices by providing a single large retail buyer with unfair pricing advantages,” report Dave Michaels and Laura Cooper. “The lawsuit, filed in Manhattan federal court, is premised on a decades-old law that forbids suppliers from selling goods at different prices to retailers. The statute, which dates from the 1930s, sought to preserve a level playing field between small retailers and bigger sellers such as grocery chains. The FTC under Chair Lina Khan has sought to revive enforcement of the law, which withered during the 1980s as critics argued it effectively disallowed discounting and resulted in higher prices.”
Will MAHA add alcohol to its list of health foes? (STAT). “Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his allies in the “Make America Healthy Again” movement have no shortage of targets — products, policies, foods and drinks that they see as worsening the nation’s health. Alcohol seems to have so far avoided their outrage,” Isabella Cueto writes. “In many ways, alcoholic drinks share commonalities with the foods Kennedy wants to crack down on, said Nicholas Reville, executive director of the nonprofit Center for Addiction Science, Policy, and Research. Both alcohol and ultra-processed foods can become addictive, buzzing through the brain’s pleasure circuitry and driving intense cravings in some people. Many forms of alcohol are even considered ultra-processed foods, since they contain additives, preservatives, and added sugars — but often don’t need to list them on labels. Both are also linked to various common health problems, though the evidence of alcohol’s risks is more clear-cut than that of ultra-processed foods.”
Personal injury powerhouse Parker Waichman goes after alcohol industry over cancer (The Oregonian). “The Surgeon General’s advisory on alcohol and cancer risk inspired Parker Waichman LLP, a New York City-based law firm specializing in personal injury, mass tort and environmental law, to announce it was seeking plaintiffs for a class-action lawsuit against the alcohol industry,” reports Michael Alberty. “Parker Waichman is best known for suing the Trump Organization in 2023 for inflating the rent of 14,000 rent-controlled New York City apartments as well as its class-action suit on behalf of people injured by toxic substances in the water at Camp Lejeune, a U.S. Marine base in Jacksonville, North Carolina. The firm claims on its website to have recovered over two billion dollars for its clients.”
New obesity definition sidelines BMI to focus on health (nature). “Amid the rising buzz around Ozempic and similar weight-loss drugs, a group of 58 researchers is challenging the way obesity is defined and diagnosed, arguing that current methods fail to capture the complexity of the condition,” reports Giorgia Guglielmi. “The group’s revised definition, published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology on 14 January, focuses on how excess body fat, a measure called adiposity, affects the body, rather than relying only on body mass index (BMI), which links a person’s weight to their height. They propose two categories: preclinical obesity, when a person has extra body fat but their organs work normally, and clinical obesity, when excess fat harms the body’s organs and tissues. This shift could improve clinical care, public-health policies and societal attitudes toward obesity, says Elisabeth van Rossum, an endocrinologist at the Erasmus University Medical Center Rotterdam in the Netherlands.”
How would RFK Jr. handle bird flu? His record on vaccines has experts on edge (NPR). “Bird flu’s unprecedented spread among livestock and other mammals in the U.S. has raised fears that another pandemic could be in store. The incoming Trump administration will have to prepare for this risk,” writes Will Stone. “Trump and his picks to helm federal health agencies have largely been silent on bird flu. Trump’s choice to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F Kennedy Jr., has an extensive history of making inaccurate and misleading statements on vaccines and infectious diseases. He’s a lawyer who for years led an advocacy group that is a major player in the anti-vaccine movement, promoting the long-debunked idea that vaccines lead to autism, among other false claims. He’s also made specific comments undermining trust in the bird flu vaccines. In an online post last summer, he claimed there’s ‘no evidence’ the licensed shots for the national stockpile will work and that they ‘appear dangerous.’”
Have Americans ever really been healthy? (New York Times). “‘We will make Americans healthy again,’ Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has declared. A political action committee that has promoted Mr. Kennedy, President-elect Donald J. Trump’s pick for health and human services secretary, says his movement is ‘igniting a health revolution in America,’” writes Gina Kolata. “But the word ‘again’ presumes a time in the country’s past when Americans were in better health. Was there ever really a time when America was healthier? … ‘No,’ said Nancy Tomes, a historian at Stony Brook University. … Dr. Jeremy Greene, a historian at Johns Hopkins University, asked: ‘Which particular era does R.F.K. want to take us back to?’”
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