The FDA Formally Banned Pink Dye No. 3 From Use in Meals, Drinks, and Medicines

It is official: The Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) has banned Pink Dye No. 3 in meals, drinks, and ingested medication within the U.S.

The Washington Submit reported that Pink dye No. 3 should be faraway from meals merchandise by mid-January 2027 and from ingested medication in 2028. The FDA famous on its web site that it used the Delaney Clause, which prohibits components discovered to trigger most cancers in people, as the idea for the ban.

“The Delaney Clause is evident; the FDA can’t authorize a meals additive or coloration additive if it has been discovered to trigger most cancers in people or animals,” Jim Jones, the FDA’s deputy commissioner for human meals, mentioned in an announcement shared with reporters. 

As for what, precisely, it will likely be faraway from, the FDA famous that Pink No. 3 has been “primarily utilized in sure meals merchandise, akin to sweet, desserts and cupcakes, cookies, frozen desserts, and frostings and icings,” which means your store-bought sweet will possible are available in just a little little bit of a distinct hue in a number of years. 

In 2022, Shopper Studies signed a petition led by the Middle for Science within the Public Curiosity calling for a ban of Pink Dye 3, and in October of 2024, Shopper Studies additionally delivered a petition signed by greater than 80,000 shoppers asking the FDA for the ban. Now, the group says it is “applauding” the FDA’s resolution. 

“Pink Dye 3 poses an unacceptable danger to our well being, particularly when safer alternate options are available,” Brian Ronholm, director of meals coverage at Shopper Studies, shared in an announcement offered to Meals & Wine. “By banning Pink Dye 3, the FDA will shield the general public by encouraging producers to change to safer components already utilized in merchandise offered in Europe and quite a few different nations.”

Nonetheless, the group added that it’s going to proceed to press the FDA to ban different artificial meals dyes linked to neurobehavioral issues. It pointed to a 2021 examine by the California Workplace of Environmental Well being Hazard Evaluation, which discovered that many meals dyes and colorants — together with the six dyes now banned beneath the California College Meals Security Act — might make youngsters extra weak to behavioral difficulties.
 
“Many artificial meals dyes are allowed in meals however haven’t been reviewed for security by the FDA in a long time regardless of current research which have linked the chemical substances to severe well being issues,” Ronholm added. “It’s time for the FDA to meet up with the newest science and get these dangerous chemical substances out of our meals.”