Are food dyes worth banning?

Let's catch ourselves up on food dyes, you know, food coloring, and the current US government push to ban these synthetic ones. I think this topic is interesting both scientifically and uh politically because, you know, people on both the far left and the far right tend to share a distrust of food dyes. I suspect that distrust is significantly the result of motivated reasoning. People finding a way to believe whatever it is they want to believe. Nonetheless, some real science does raise some real concerns about some food dyes. We will be talking mostly about US food regulation here, but we will acknowledge some parallel developments over in Europe. These two regulatory regimes tend to set the market for much of the rest of the world. Anyway, the US has been regulating food dyes since the 1880s originally, mostly because food dyes were being used to disguise rotten food. Sometimes it's not about whether the food additive is itself good or bad for you. Sometimes it's about how that additive affects the marketability of a food that may be good or bad for you. We've talked about this before in regard to MSG, monosodium glutamate. The evidence that MSG in food directly causes health problems is slim at best. What MSG does for sure is it makes deep fried corn paste way more delicious, Doritos, etc. Something similar may be true of food dyes. It would be hard to quantify, but it is certainly possible that the most significant health impact of food dyes is that they make Skittles and Froot Loops and Mountain Dew all way more appealing than they would be otherwise, especially to children. A diet that strictly excludes food dyes would almost certainly make you healthier, just like a diet that strictly excludes added sugars. And for the same reason, it would knock out virtually all the junk food. You would have no choice but to mostly eat fresh foods, which would probably be better for you, unless you did something really extreme and foolish, like an all bacon diet. But even that probably wouldn't be as bad as you'd think. because you probably wouldn't want to eat a huge amount of bacon every day. Skittles and Froot Loops and Mountain Dew. Oh, it is very easy to eat a whole lot of these every single day. Ask me how I know. Anyway, point is sometimes food additives are bad because they make you more likely to eat bad foods. But sometimes food additives are bad in and of themselves. And back when the US government started regulating food dyes in the late 19th century, some of the dyes in common use back then were uh arsenic, mercury, lead. Dairies routinely would dye their milk slightly yellow with lead chromate, I guess, to make it look like the milk had a slightly higher fat content than it really did. Heavy metals really are directly bad for you. So, it was good that the Food and Drugs Act of 1906 banned those as food dyes. The law also banned the use of any colorant to conceal the inferiority of a product. I do wonder if we're really all still following that particular provision of the law. I tell you, one food company with no need whatsoever to conceal anything is Factor, sponsor of this video. Let me thank them before we move on. Factor sends delicious, never frozen meals to my door and alls I got to do is heat them up. That's it. That's all. I am a busy person. I am a physically active person. I need to eat throughout the day to hit my strength training goals. And instead of eating shelf stable junk food, I can just throw a factor meal in the microwave for 2 minutes. get some hot fresh vegetables and lean protein that I actually enjoy eating. The flavor of these dishes is legitimately outstanding. The vegetables come crisp and green. The meats are juicy. The folks at Factor have really made some supply chain innovations to make all this possible. And now they have doubled the size of the menu. You got 80 plus rotating weekly meal options. If you want meat, you can get beef fillets, salmon, baramundi, which is an awesome white fish. But if you don't like something, you can now swap select proteins for no extra cost. There are meatless plans, gluten-free plans, whatever you need. Head to factor75.com or click the link below and use code regusia FB50 to get 50% off plus free breakfast for 1 year. That's code regusia FB50. FB for free breakfast. Regusia FB50 at factor75.com. Get 50% off plus free breakfast for one year. Thank you, Factor. Anyway, the Food and Drugs Act of 1906 banned the use of toxic heavy metals as food coloring. Nice. Nobrainer. The following year, the US Department of Agriculture started issuing a list of food dyes that you can use. There were seven, the original seven approved food dyes. None of them are in use anymore. Some of them just fell out of favor because better dyes came on the market. Others of the original seven were banned because it turned out that they were not as safe as initially believed. A notable example would be orange number one. The numbering system used in the US is set by the FDA and it basically just reflects the order in which the dyes were considered by government scientists. Orange one was the first orange they approved. Its chemical name is way too long to read, which is why they gave it a number. In the 1950s, the FDA office in Kansas City got a complaint about some orange Halloween candy. Bunch of kids who ate the same candy came down with abdominal cramps and diarrhea. The FDA did some tests and found that as few as 12 of the little individually wrapped candies caused similar symptoms in human volunteers. That must have been fun. Oh, the things that scientists used to be allowed to do to people with hardly any institutional guard rails. The good old days. Anyway, turned out that the company had used a huge amount of orange number one to get the deep orange color that they wanted for what uh looked to me to have been like little Halloween taffies. Taffy is a pulled or stretched candy, meaning that you incorporate air into the sugar matrix. and air really like softens and lightens the colors. You need extra pigment if you want intense color in a pulled candy. The total mass of this candy in Kansas City was upwards of 2% orange number one. In doses that high, it turned out that orange number one makes you sick to your stomach. In the history of government regulation, that is one of the least dramatic inciting incidents. It's certainly no triangle shirt waist fire. There's a more dramatic case from the cosmetics industry, which uses a lot of the same dyes. In the 1930s, a mascara called Lash Lure blinded several women and killed one. It contained a dye called paraffenoliamine PPD. PPD which causes severe contact dermatitis in the approximately 1.5% of people who are allergic to it. PPD is still used in hair dyes today but not around the eyes where the skin is a lot more sensitive. Plus, we have drugs now for people who get severe allergic reactions. Back then they didn't. Such synthetic dyes were known at the time as colar dyes because they were made from colar which was an abundant byproduct back then. To this day synthetic colorants whether used in cosmetics or food they tend to be made from petroleum petroleum products of various kinds. Is that a reason to be scared of them? Are you eating crude oil when you eat a synthetic food dye? Not really. No. The oil was just the chemical starting point, the precursor. Petroleum products are good abundant precursors for synthesizing all kinds of organic molecules because petroleum is itself organic. It's the stuff of ancient organisms, mostly plankton and algae that decomposed under anorobic conditions deep beneath the earth. It's just dead stuff like all our other food is. That doesn't mean all dead stuff is food, but it does mean that all food is dead stuff. Crude oil is not food. Eating crude oil would make you really sick, but that's not what you're eating when you eat something synthesized from oil. To synthesize a chemical, you take your precursor chemical and you expose it to other chemicals in certain conditions to create reactions. Chemical reactions that will eventually leave you with the new molecule that you're looking for. Now, that molecule could be identical to a molecule found naturally in a fruit or something, and its effect on your health would be exactly the same because it's literally the same stuff. If it's a natural colorant, that means a plant or some other organism biosynthesized the molecule from dead stuff, the dead stuff of the earth. If it's synthetic, that means a chemist synthesized it from the dead stuff of the earth. There are synthetic dyes that are molecularly identical to natural dyes. It's simply that the synthetic dye is cheaper to make. But the result is again literally the same stuff. So no, I don't think that we should automatically reject any food or cosmetic that's synthesized from petroleum. Though I suppose the fact that it was synthesized in a lab could legitimately be considered a kind of red flag, something that isn't necessarily disqualifying, but it should prompt a more thorough review. After all, artificial chemical synthesis allows us to make all kinds of chemicals, some of which are new, some of which are not commonly found in nature, and thus we don't have as much experience with them. We probably should subject those to some extra scrutiny before we declare them safe. Chemical synthesis also allows us to make certain molecules in much greater abundance than they would typically be found in nature and for way less cost. Sending a cheap petroleum byproduct over a catalyst in a lab can be vastly less expensive than juicing that same molecule from the body of the one tropical insect that makes it or whatever. So even if it's a familiar molecule that we're synthesizing, science allows us to get way more of it than we're maybe used to. And so that should be a red flag, right? Not necessarily disqualifying, but a reason to give something a second look when it comes to safety. So that's why we got the color additive amendments of 1960. The FDA came out and said more clearly that you can only use color additives for food if they're on the government's approved list. And that new list as of 1960 was a provisional list of about 200 dyes. 200 dyes that by then were in common use and did not seem to be acutely toxic. At least the FDA created a bureaucratic process by which you could get your colorant moved off of the provisional list and onto the permanent list. But you have to provide scientific proof that your dye is safe long term. Proof that it isn't chronically toxic, something that could make you sick in more insidious ways than a sudden acute reaction. What's an example of a more insidious long-term problem that could be caused by a food dye? Well, how's about cancer? Regarding cancer, the 1960 amendments contained something called the Delaney Clause, named after its chief proponent, New York Congressman James Delaney, who was also the driving force behind the federal ban on switchblade knives. No fun, this guy. The Delaney clause states that the government may not approve any food dye if that dye has been shown to cause cancer in human or animal studies. That may sound like a real good idea, but I'm going to let you think about it for a minute. I bet you could see the problem with that. Quote, "A color additive shall be deemed unsafe if the additive is found to induce cancer when ingested by man or animal." End quote. The Delaney clause remains the law of the land in the United States, even though it is kind of ridiculous on its face. Why? Say it along with me at home, kids. The dose makes the poison. Very good. Almost everything can be shown to cause cancer if you cram enough of it into a lab rat. It's not a colorant, but consider the example of vitamin E. Vitamin E is a fat-soluble antioxidant that all of us require for our normal life functions. And yet in extremely high, totally unrealistic doses, vitamin E is associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer. Are we going to ban vitamin E? No, obviously, because we need vitamin E. We do not need food dyes. Food dyes are just for fun. Food dyes are they're just for the lols, right? And thus, I suppose it does make sense to only allow the ones that are really, really, really safe. But the Delaney Amendment goes too far. And I am hardly the only person to say that. Lots of things are carcinogenic when you isolate them from real food and inject a thousand times the normal dose into a little white mouse every day for 6 weeks or whatever. There are food dyes that might be the best safest option in actual food that are nonetheless banned because of this rather blunt zero tolerance approach that is enshrined in US statutory law. Consider the case of red number three arythraine known as uh E127 in the European labeling system. Despite EU food safety authorities being notoriously conservative, red 3 remains legal in Europe for certain uses, most notably cherries. 40-year-old research indicates that Red 3 may be associated with thyroid cancer in mice, again in enormous doses that you would never get to in the context of the products for which Red 3 is approved. and yet it remained on the approved list in the US until the very beginning of this year. One of the last acts of the Biden administration was to ban red dye number three starting in 2027 is when it takes effect. Why? the brilliant, highly qualified career food epidemiologists who used to run the FDA until very recently. Were those smart people really that worried about red dye number three? No, they just got sued. Well, not sued, they got petitioned by two dozen organizations, including the Center for Science in the Public Interest. The CSPI is an awesome nonprofit and the people there do incredibly important work. They also have a reputation in the scientific community for being, let's say, very zealous in their consumer advocacy. Zeal is good, especially when you're trying to protect everyday people from giant corporations. I am not qualified to say whether the CSPI folks are overzealous. Sometimes certainly their basic argument about red number three is coherent. Food dyes are completely unnecessary. Therefore, there ought to be zero acceptable risks associated with them. If there's any cancer risk at all, get rid of it, is what they say over at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. But the FDA didn't seem super worried when they announced their ban in January. They basically just said, "Yeah, we've got this really inflexible thing called the Delaney Amendment that says that we have to ban this stuff. So, we're banning this stuff." What's wrong with being overcautious? If that is in fact what's going on here, what's wrong with being overcautious? And certainly I'm not qualified to say whether that is what's going on here, but let's just assume for a second that they're being overcautious. It is awfully rare for the US to ban a food additive that even the EU says is safe. What's wrong with being overcautious? Because the food industry is going to food industry. They know that if they make a product fire engine red, us morons are going to buy that and we're going to stuff our faces with it. If we ban one red dye, the food industry is going to use a different red dye. And we have no idea if that new dye is going to be more or less safe than the one we just banned. Some of the so-called natural dyes out there are some of the least studied. Just because you isolated a colorant from an algae or a fungus or something doesn't mean it's safe. The most obvious replacement for red number three is red number 40. Scientific name dodium 6 hydroxy 5. I'm just going to stop there because it keeps going and going. Red 40 is by far the most commonly used red dye nowadays. It has its own concerning mice studies. One study associated it with bowel disorders, another with DNA damage that could conceivably lead to cancer, though cancer was not directly observed in that study. Again, these are studies where they give insanely high doses to mice. The Europeans call red 40 E129 and they looked at banning it a few years ago, but eventually they were like, "Nah, it's fine." They concluded that there is no population that exceeds the 7 mg per kilo of body weight that is the acceptable daily intake. But here's where things get interesting. Red 40 is one of several dyes that a growing body of research links to behavioral problems in kids. Irritability, hyperactivity, impulsivity. How could food dyes do that to a kid? Nobody knows. These chemicals may interfere with our neurotransmitters directly or they might do things in our gut that indirectly affect our brains. Kids may be more susceptible because their nervous system is still developing. We don't know. Science is working on it and studies have yielded mixed results. Lots of studies find this behavioral link. Lots of studies don't. And obviously it depends a lot on which food dye that you look at and the dosage. Probably the best evidence for a food dye causing hyperactivity concerns yellow dye number five, tartrezine E102 in Europe. The way they normally study these things is they get a group of kids, they eliminate food dyes from their diet for a few weeks and then they start adding in the particular food dye that they are studying at various doses. Then you assess the kid's behavior and compare it to their behavior during the elimination phase. Tartraine is particularly concerning because studies have found this behavioral link at like realistic doses. at the doses that you would get from drinking some Mountain Dews, for example. That's where the yellow color comes from in Mountain Dew. Yellow five. Kids with pre-existing behavioral problems seem to be more susceptible. The dye may exacerbate existing conditions rather than cause new ones. Some kids don't seem to be affected at all and the behavioral effects observed are generally not enormous, but some have been noticeable. It's important for listeners outside the United States to understand that however dysfunctional our federal government may be, our individual state governments all have their own governors and legislators and health departments that do a whole lot of good work. California, our largest state by far, often functions as a kind of shadow federal government because if California bans a food additive, lots of companies will take that ingredient out of all of the products that they sell everywhere because they don't want to have to build a special product line just for California. Couple years ago, California's Environmental Protection Agency published the most comprehensive literature review ever attempted on the link between food dyes and neurobbehavioral problems. And the conclusion of that review of all the studies that have ever been done is that yes, there is a link in some but not all children according to the preponderance of the evidence, but we don't know much more than that. We routinely deal with much much bigger and clearer health risks in our lives. But because you can easily ban a food die without too many people missing it, you just ban it. Cars are vastly more dangerous. But if you banned cars, that would be a big deal to a lot of people. Food dyes are comparatively expendable. So, since that 2021 review, the California legislature has passed laws restricting a number of common food dyes, including yellow five and red 40. These are not all outright bans. Some of these laws just ban the dyes in school food, for example. But California was way out ahead of the rest of the country on this until Donald Trump assumed the presidency again this year. and appointed Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary. MAGA is not about to be outdone by a bunch of West Coast liberals. Or at least that was the impression RFK Jr. gave at his April press conference where he announced his intention to ban all synthetic food dyes. But what did Kennedy actually do? almost nothing. He started the process to ban citrus red number two and orange B, which industry insiders say no one actually uses anymore. It's not exactly bold or brave to ban things that aren't in use. It's just an easy way to look like you're doing something. RFK also announced that his department would work with the food industry to voluntarily phase out six other dyes, including red 40 and yellow 5. There is no new law. There's no new regulation. Just a handshake agreement. We'll see if anything comes of it. The food industry has made similar promises before that everyone conveniently forgot about a few years later. The FDA has the power to just ban these dyes outright if they want to. And it's notable that they chose to not do that. These are some of the biggest, most powerful companies in the country that produce these foods. And they are not as easy to push around as more vulnerable groups. It's notable that RFK is taking a light touch here. Maybe a light touch is all that will be needed. But if you care what I think, I am not impressed by this new push from the government. A, it's not that new. We've been banning food dyes since forever. B. The stated focus of this effort is to rid the food supply of petroleumbased synthetic food dyes. Again, there is no particular reason to believe that the synthetic ones are more dangerous than the natural dyes that you might use instead. Hey, I developed a new food coloring by breeding a microscopic fungus that biosynthesizes the same molecule that we used to artificially synthesize. That makes it natural. That makes it safe, right? Again, as a shortorthhand, it might make sense to be more wary of the synthetic dyes than the natural dyes, but as a matter of national policy, we got to be more specific than that. and C. The focus on food dyes is a not particularly egregious example of the same grift at the heart of all of RFK Jr.'s dietary initiatives. He knows that we don't want to change our diet and lifestyle. The diet and lifestyle that's making us fat and sick. He knows we don't want to change that. We want to keep eating junk food and we want to keep sitting at our computers all day and driving places that we could easily walk to. RFK knows that we don't want to make painful sacrifices to improve our health. So to make us think that he is making America healthy again, RFK says, "Hey, blame the chemicals. Keep eating at Steak and Shake or whatever. keep shoveling deep fried carbs in your face. All we have to do is get out the toxins. Well, I got bad news. The food, however delicious, is the toxin. The lifestyle is the toxin. Banning a few convenient scapegoat additives that no one will miss is the least courageous, least effective way possible to address our various national public health crises. It's all just a show. What else is new? But like I said, the push against food dyes is hardly the most egregious example of this particular grift. There actually are good reasons to restrict food dyes, even more than we already have. This neurobbehavioral problem in kids seems to be a real thing, at least in some kids. But we need to address the problem thoughtfully because it came from petroleum is not a good enough reason to ban a food dye. That's the kind of mindless, knee-jerk approach that could get us food dyes that are actually worse than the ones we banned. or rather the ones we voluntarily phased out. It's about time to voluntarily phase out myself. Hopefully, the replacement will actually be an improvement. Make good choices. Talk to you next time.