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Coca-Cola and Pepsi Change Recipe To Avoid Cancer Warning
jones_supa writes "California has added 4-methylimidazole (a caramel coloring) to the list of carcinogenic compounds that require an explicit warning when added to foodstuffs. Incidentally, this has entailed the big two cola producers to modify their recipe to decrease the amount of the substance — just enough to avoid the warning. The change to the recipe has already been introduced in California but will be rolled out across the U.S. to streamline manufacturing. The American Beverage Association noted that there is not enough evidence to show the coloring to cause cancer in humans."
Everybody knows that everything causes cancer in California.
California needs to just put out a warning saying that life has been linked to incidences of cancer.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
"But he noted that a consumer would have to drink more than 1,000 cans a day to reach the doses administered that have shown links to cancer in rodents."
The American Beverage Association also noted that California added the coloring to its list of carcinogens with no studies showing that it causes cancer in humans. It noted that the listing was based on a single study in lab mice and rats.
They come up with a new rule, and rest of the nation has to adapt to it?
Fuck CA.
Quit selling coke there, or just bottle it there for their needs. I'm tired of all the restrictions on car exhausts and all...that shouldn't not affect me.
Well, Ok, where I live I can get away with modding my car since there is no *sniff* test where I live for an inspection...but still, they make a rule and often it takes the fun out of it for the rest of the states because manufacturers don't want to make multiple versions.....grrrrrr
I'm sure there are other good examples, but those are the ones that hit me off the top of my head...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The same 1000 cans argument can be made for aspartame as a sweetner, tail pipe exhaust, and smoking crack. What if you're that one person with a a genetic predisposition to get cancer from this substance? We should be doing what the EU has done for years- make manufacturers prove substances are safe for consumption before including them as ingredients.
Stay skeptical, my friends.
Is there any chemical California has not added to their list of carcinogenic compounds?
threatened.
Did anyone else ever notice how much Ferengis look, sound and act like members of a certain real country on planet earth that is overflowing with and run by psychopaths?
Oy!
Now all Coke/Pepsi has to do is remove the toxic sugar http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM and it'll be perfect. ;-)
The ingredient in question is only used for coloring the product and doesn't contribute anything at all to the taste. I can't see reduced levels as anything but a good thing if there is even a small risk that it is a carcinogen.
to stick something OpenBSD. How many volume of NetBSD population as well to ge`t some eye sanctions, and
Will Slurm be affected in any way, shape, or form? If so, and the New Slurm tastes horrible, can I hold out for a return of Slurm Classic?
"Quote me as saying I was mis-quoted." -Groucho Marx
a day late and a dollar short
...it's Crystal Pepsi!!
can we get some real sugar again? Your HFCS sodas taste like shit.
I recently purchased a corded airbed pump. On the electrical cord is a label:
"This product contains lead, a substance known to the state of California to cause birth defects. Wash hands after handling."
Yep. There's lead-based solder ENCASED IN PLASTIC, but you should still wash your hands after touching the plastic.
...is also present in dark beers and roasted foods. It is one of many substances, like acrylamide, formed during browning. So, even if they avoid it in cola drinks, we can expect California warning labels on more foods and beverages. (California OEHHA proposed slapping a warning label on everything containing acrylamide about five years ago, but they got a lot of pushback on that one).
Polar bears... where art thou
It's also interesting that California, cancer-paranoid as they are, still approved medical cannabis legislation, and famously so.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Have there ever been a study done to show how many people who have or had got cancer did so because this one compound? It seems every month another substance gets added to this list, in 10 years we wont be able to eat anything because everything will cause cancer. I would be surprised if this compound has caused over 0.00001% of all cancer.
I just got back from a trip to SF and noticed signs in the airport that said something totally vague, like "Some stuff here may cause cancer." Um, what stuff? How bad is the risk? Should I leave? Will I be exposed by breathing the air or touching surfaces? Would wearing shoes and gloves protect me? Should I be wearing Nomex, Kevlar, or a biohazard suit? Gas mask? Where else should I go? Should I assume that anywhere without those signs is 100% safe? What if I was in a cancer-causing area and some jackass took the signs down? Then I'd be screwed, right?
Dumb, dumb, dumb.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
It's an easy assumption to make. But wrong.
Look it up. Studies show either no increased cancer risk from cannabis use, or even a slightly protective (anti-cancer) effect.
Emphysema on the other hand...
I once worked in a retail store in Menlo Park, CA, and it seemed like every week we were being sent Prop 65 "this product contains a chemical known to the state of California to cause cancer" warning stickers for some product we'd been carrying for years that had suddenly made the list. So one day I took the extra stickers and put them on bottles of Dasani water in the Coke cooler, just to point out how ridiculous the whole thing was. No one noticed. I knew I should have put them on the Coke!
Alot more "Un-Nerdy" stories being posted lately since 'Taco left. Is a shift in content what drove him to leave?
I guess what happens in Vegas NOT ALWAYS STAYS IN VEGAS: If you get an Std. Just saying
They could have spun this to 'we care about our customers health' instead of ' we just want to avoid some stupid government label'.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Was wondering why recently there was a yellow dot on my Pepsi can....heard it was for color alignment but perhaps it's for the modded recipe??
how many ounces in a full LoC?? I mean, thats a big building
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
the American Beverage Association is a trade organization that represents the beverage industry in the United States. Its members include producers and bottlers of soft drinks, bottled water, and other non-alcoholic beverages.
the American Beverage Association frankly has no idea at all if this chemical is hazardous, at what levels and under what conditions. they have published no known study. they have 25 lobbyists across seven firms and their purpose is to limit warning labels on their products regardless of the actual science.
to clarify, The Center For Science in the Public Interest (we like them. theyre good guys) concluded 4-methylimidazole is added as a caramel coloring in some dark beers and soy sauces. its bad. to further cut past the knee jerk spinjob article from OP, heres the release from CSPI:
http://www.cspinet.org/new/201102161.html
and a quote out of the article as to what precisely theyre targeting...
"Federal regulations distinguish among four types of caramel coloring, two of which are produced with ammonia and two without it. CSPI wants the Food and Drug Administration to prohibit the two made with ammonia. The type used in colas and other dark soft drinks is known as Caramel IV, or ammonia sulfite process caramel. Caramel III, which is produced with ammonia but not sulfites, is sometimes used in beer, soy sauce, and other foods. "
Good people go to bed earlier.
did coca-cola get rid of the BPA yet?
1000 12 oz. cans of coke per day is 822 lbs of soda per day, which is 46 times the amount of water which should kill a 200 lb. person (LD50 of water is 90g/kg, the coke in a can of coke is 373g).
Kansas is considering a law that requires doctors to tell women seeking abortions that the procedure causes cancer.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2366200/?tool=pubmed
note the PPM 1250 and 5000
from http://www.itwire.com/science-news/health/53314-coke-and-pepsi-new-formulas-have-less-cancer-causing-stuff?start=1
, “the FDA’s limit for 4-MEI in caramel coloring is 250 parts per million (ppm). That caramel would then be diluted when it is put in soda. The highest levels of 4-MEI found by CSPI were about 0.4 ppm,
So to even begin to enter the risk are, you would need to drink 1000 cans.
And they don't 'add it' tit comes naturally form the cooking of the caramel.
Just so people know, you get it in pretty much anything the browns.
As always, it's the dose that makes the poison;.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
That article is alarmist and misleading. .4ppm... Which is about what you would get from any browning process.
A) Coca-coal doesn't 'add it'. It is created when caramel is made. BTW, Coca-cola doesn't make caramel, they buy it from suppliers.
B) a serving has
FDA say 250ppm is where the issue might begin. However, the studies regarding 4-MI see an effect in rats over 1250 ppm:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2366200/?tool=pubmed
And anyone who had a parody of the item they are allegedly looking into cannot be trusted. Clearly they are biased.
And why, exactly, makes you think the CSPI are the good guys? Because everything I read from them is always misleading, it is always biased, and it is always full of logical fallacy's. They are either following an agenda that falls under naturalist fallacies, or they are just incompetent.
The 4-MI levels in soda aren't even worth noting, but hey6 they can't get funding by being honest and reasonable.
Fuck. Them.
Which is in NO WAY an endorsement of ABA.
I mean, look at this:
"But the levels of 4-MI in the tested colas still may be causing thousands of cancers in the U.S. population."
False. There is no evidence of that at all. Unless there are people drinking 100's of cans of soda everyday for weeks on end.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
First off, lots of things that are "perfectly legal activities" when done in private where only consenting adults are exposed to them cease to be perfectly legal activities when they affect people other than adults voluntarily participating in the activity.
Secondly, California allows public smoking, it just prohibits most indoor workplaces (though there are some exceptions) from subjecting workers to tobacco smoke. In doing so, its rules are in line with those in the majority of US states. (There are some localities, notably Calabasas, in California with stronger smoking bans than the state has, but those are local rules, not state rules.)
Liter of Cola?
horror vacui
Bad news, roasted coffee samples had 0.307 to 1.241 mg/kg of 4-MI
You need to look at the dose. It take 1000 cans to even get to the range where it would ahve a chance to casue canser igf you are predisposed.
Look at the numbers:
Studies in rats show effects at 1250 ppm, and fmakle rtas at 5000ppm had a higher risk.
Coca-Cola has .4 ppm
You can't even cross the point where its a risk at all.
So, no worries.
Of course, there is no evidence at all that this can, is, or has happened in humans..but the Rat/Mouse studies where pretty well done. I
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
This is exactly the problem. We aren't sure which signs to give priority. Lots of things cause cancer, but there is a significant difference between smoking cigarettes, inhaling gasoline fumes, and caramel color.
On the other hand, I think it is reasonable to inform the public about what chemicals are used in an area (like a gas station) and to suggest that they limit their exposure. One of these times California will require a cancer warning label on something that has a powerful lobby (like the corn lobby) and the state is going to get sued hard.
There are bans on public smoking in 3 major cities in California already. You can be cited for smoking on the side walk or in a public park. And 2 more have put the issue up on the ballot for 2012.
To put things in perspective, life style choices (poor diet, alcohol, smoking, overweight, lack of exercise, viruses etc.) & occupational exposures (e.g. hexavalent chromium, asbestos) cause 42% of cancers in the UK. However, the Center For Science In The Public Interest (CSPI) publication (that kicked all this off) claims 4-MeI might cause 0.008% of cancers (i.e. 8 times the Californian 1 in 100,000 action level) if everyone drank 12 fl oz of cola a day over 70 years.
If you take this seriously, you really should become an physically fit, teetotal, non-smoking, asexual vegetarian with an ideal BMI. Doing this could be as much as 5250 times more important that giving up cola.
Also, the predictions only work if the handful of very high dose animal experiments (that show carcinogenesis) are naively extrapolated to very low level human exposures... while assuming (without evidence) a strictly linear relationship between dose and cancer risk for 4-MeI i.e. a linear no-threshold response (LNT), ignoring other dose-risk relationships e.g. threshold (harmless) and hormesis (beneficial) responses at very low levels. Indeed, the CSPI admits that researchers are investigating if 4-MeI might reduce certain cancers by modifying hormones. Lastly, judging the toxicity of chemicals in humans from animal experiments is not straightforward, a massive dose of TCDD Dioxin kills lab rats stone dead but gives us humans a nasty case of acne (see Viktor Yushchenko). So all in all, just more evidence that people are rubbish at properly assessing risk when fear gets in the way.
Parkin et al., 2011. 16. The fraction of cancer attributable to lifestyle and environmental factors in the UK in 2010. Br J Cancer 105(S2), S77–S81.
Kaiser, J. 2003. HORMESIS: Sipping From a Poisoned Chalice. Science 302(5644), 376–379.
Think for a moment why colorings are added. Is it good public policy to allow this?
This is essentially false advertizing. We humans have evolved to associate various colors with some idea of "goodness", allowing us to get proper nutrition. These colors make us instinctively prefer manufactured products. This is bad for our health.
You might say "buyer beware", but that doesn't solve the problem. People suffer horrible health problems related to junkfood.
This is nothing but a politically motivated "threat" aka sodium cyclmate. I don't know of anyone who can drink more than 1,000 cans of coke a day without going into a diabetic coma.
Everything
Everything gives you cancer
Everything
Everything gives you cancer
There's no cure, there's no answer
Everything gives you cancer
Don't touch that dial
Don't try to smile
Just take this pill
It's in your file
Don't work hard
Don't play hard
Don't plan for the graveyard
Remember
(Refrain)
Don't work by night
Don't sleep by day
You'll feel all right
But you will pay
No caffeine
No protein
No booze or
Nicotine
Remember
(Refrain)
(Unfortunately, Joe Jackson's kind of a dick about cigarettes, inasmuch as he has a habit of going off on weird tinfoil-hat tangents about how their health dangers are imaginary and it's all a big scam. Otherwise a great singer and songwriter, though.)
Contrary to what you see here , implying california is without cause with wanting this label, here is an in vivo study on the effect of the aforementionned substance :
PUBMED article on rat study
Now I am not sure whether the panic is granted due to the amount spoken of which are order of magnitude greater than what we take in food, but caution is warranted.
Beer contains 4 ingredients: barley, hops, yeast, and water. If the "dark beer" you speak of is not naturally dark, then I regret to inform you that it is not beer.
I bought an 88-key m-audio midi controller and there was a huge sticker on the manual saying it causes cancer. I was like well wtf if this causes cancer why is it even for sale? is this some kind of weird ploy by the tobacco industry to make everything seem to cause cancer so the surgeon generals warnings go unnoticed?
"this has entailed the big two cola producers to modify their recipe to decrease" They both use the same recipe? Or does nobody copy-edit anything anymore?