Synthetic food dyes add a burst of color to many beloved American foods, such as candy, cereal, and even bacon. But some dyes — like Red No. 3 — have links to cancer, behavioral disorders, and other health issues.
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00Artificial dyes are all over American foods.
00:05Nowadays, they're usually derived from petroleum.
00:09Some dyes, like red number three,
00:12have been linked to cancer, ADHD,
00:14and issues with the nervous system.
00:16Red number three has already been banned
00:18in Europe, Japan, and China,
00:21but its use in the U.S. has only grown
00:23over the last few decades.
00:25Now, for the first time since the 90s,
00:27synthetic food colors are under fire.
00:30California has banned a whole spectrum of food dyes,
00:34and RFK has vowed to do the same at the national level.
00:38So why are these colorings still so common in the U.S.,
00:41and what would it take to ban them?
00:44I'm Mia de Graaf,
00:45and I'm a health editor at Business Insider.
00:48So how do we start using natural dyes in the first place?
00:51Natural red dyes, like cochineal,
00:54date back thousands of years in Mexico.
00:58It comes from bugs raised on cactuses, called cochineals.
01:04And the acid in their guts makes a vibrant red dye.
01:07Across Europe and the Middle East,
01:09red color was derived from madder,
01:11a plant from the coffee family.
01:13Archaeologists found traces of it in linen
01:15found in Tutankhamun's tomb,
01:18and in wool discovered in Viking burial grounds.
01:21In Asia, turmeric has been used
01:23to naturally color food and fabrics for thousands of years.
01:28And ancient civilizations in that region
01:30also extracted indigo, or blue.
01:32They would ferment indigo-ferro plant leaves in water
01:35to extract the blue color.
01:37The first food dye used in the U.S.
01:39was in the late 1800s for margarine.
01:43This dye was called butter yellow.
01:46Butter yellow is made of aniline,
01:48which is a derivative of coal.
01:49It was designed to make buttery products look more buttery.
01:54By the mid-20th century, butter yellow was phased out
01:58after it was shown to cause bladder cancer,
02:01headaches, nausea, and damage to the liver and kidneys.
02:04But other dyes came in.
02:06In 1878, we had red two, which is made from petroleum.
02:12In the early 1900s, we made red three,
02:16which is another petroleum-based dye.
02:18Soon after, there were more than a dozen
02:20artificial dyes available for sale,
02:23and most companies were favoring them over natural ones
02:26because they were cheaper.
02:28Synthetic dyes are made in labs
02:31using byproducts from coal and petroleum.
02:34These are then fused with brightly colored compounds
02:37and then ground up into a powder
02:39that can be added to food products.
02:41The chemical structures can be very different
02:44depending on how they're created.
02:46That's why some dyes that are the same color
02:49are classified with different numbers or letters.
02:52Over the years, concern about the potential health impacts
02:56of synthetic food dyes have not gone away.
03:00On Halloween in 1950, kids across the US
03:04started developing diarrhea and stomach issues.
03:08A federal investigation found that the culprit
03:10was a food dye derived from coal.
03:14It was called Orange No. 1,
03:16and it had been approved for use in 1907.
03:19The investigation found that this dye
03:21and another dye called Red 32 were extremely toxic.
03:26Tests on animals found that these dyes
03:28damaged vital organs and were linked to premature death.
03:32The FDA assembled the Delaney Committee,
03:34which was meant to investigate all of these dyes
03:37and their potential health risks.
03:39They concluded in 1960 that any new chemical
03:43needed to get FDA approval before it could be used in food,
03:47and they put the burden on companies
03:49to prove that chemicals were safe.
03:51From 1963 to 1987, the FDA approved nine new synthetic dyes
03:57to be used in foods in the US.
03:59However, all of those studies were done on animals.
04:03There were no studies in humans,
04:06and that is a really important factor to take into account.
04:09In 1990, new research showed
04:11that some of the most popular red dyes had links to cancer.
04:16That prompted the FDA to ban Red No. 3 in cosmetics.
04:20To protect consumers, the Food and Drug Administration
04:23and the Federal Trade Commission, respectively,
04:26keep careful watch for harmful ingredients in cosmetics.
04:29At the time, the FDA promised to extend that ban
04:33to food products too, but that didn't happen.
04:36Pressure from the maraschino cherry industry,
04:38among other industries, blocked that move.
04:41Now, RFK Jr. is promising to bring in
04:45an official ban at the federal level.
04:47Enough is enough.
04:48President Trump and I are gonna stop
04:51the mass poisoning of American children.
04:54He is Trump's pick to lead
04:56the Health and Human Services Department,
04:58which oversees a suite of health departments
05:01in the US government.
05:02He's proposing a lot of policy changes,
05:05but his big one is to do with nutrition,
05:07and in particular, he is promising the American people
05:10that he will get rid of food dyes in our food system.
05:14Over half the research on the health effects
05:16of synthetic food dyes shows a link
05:19between food coloring and behavioral issues in children.
05:23In the early 2000s, two new studies in the UK
05:26showed a small but significant increase in ADHD
05:30among children who consume juices
05:33with synthetic dyes in them.
05:35Those findings made a huge splash.
05:37Lawmakers in the EU and in the US reviewed this data.
05:42The EU quickly ruled that this was enough
05:45to warrant warning labels on any food
05:47containing synthetic dyes to tell consumers
05:50that there's a link to ADHD.
05:52The FDA committee considered warning labels,
05:56but concluded that more research was needed.
05:58Around 10 years ago, a bunch of food giants
06:01did agree to remove synthetic food dyes
06:04from cereals and snacks after pressure from consumers,
06:08but in the years after that,
06:09a few of them brought the dyes back,
06:12General Mills, which makes Trix cereal,
06:15said that they got so many complaints from consumers
06:18that the product was no longer as brilliant
06:21and colorful as it had been before.
06:23So they ditched the natural dyes like radish,
06:26purple carrots, and turmeric,
06:28and brought back the synthetic food dyes,
06:30which you see in this product today.
06:32Let's now look at Froot Loops.
06:35This is the product that RFK really made the focus
06:39of his presidential campaign.
06:41He said that US Froot Loops have like 18 ingredients in them
06:45and Canadian Froot Loops have like three ingredients.
06:49That's not actually true
06:51because Canadian Froot Loops also have many ingredients,
06:54but the point he was making is that the US version
06:57does have more artificial food dyes in it
07:00than other countries.
07:02So just looking at the label,
07:05we have red 40, yellow five, blue one, yellow six.
07:10So four food dyes similar to these,
07:14two, Cap'n Crunch, and Trix.
07:21And these are marketed mainly to kids.
07:24It says natural fruit flavors,
07:27sweetened multi-grain cereal,
07:29and here it says it's a good source
07:31of nine vitamins and minerals.
07:33Let's look at some snacks.
07:35We have Doritos.
07:40They are nacho cheese flavored, the best flavor.
07:43And obviously you know what you're gonna get
07:45from a packet of Doritos, a distinctive orange chip.
07:49But looking on the label, let's see.
07:52There is a lot of colors in here.
07:54Yellow six, yellow five, yellow six lake, yellow five lake.
08:00So that is yellow five and six made in two different ways
08:04and red 40.
08:07Let's get them out.
08:10All right, look at these.
08:12I mean, you can't hate them, they look amazing.
08:15But Doritos are sold in Europe as well
08:18without the artificial dyes.
08:20So this distinctive color, this smell,
08:23it is possible with natural food dyes as well.
08:27So now we're going to look at some products
08:28that do have synthetic food dyes
08:30and some which you might not expect.
08:32Sad to see, it's a saffron yellow rice.
08:36Right here at the bottom, we have artificial color
08:40including FD&C yellow number, it's hidden,
08:45yellow number five and FD&C red number three.
08:49So two artificial colors to make this as yellow
08:53as it does appear.
08:55Then you also have Morningstar Farms veggie bacon strips.
09:00It's marketed as 100% vegetarian,
09:03giving you this wake up and smell the veggie protein,
09:08the power of plants.
09:10There's a lot of things on the front of this package
09:11which the WHO would describe as a health halo.
09:14So it's things that are really marketing it
09:16as positive and good.
09:17You flip it over though and you do see, let me find it,
09:21red number three and yellow number six.
09:24You can even find food dyes in foods
09:27that you might use in healthy dishes like a salad.
09:29So look at this for example.
09:31This is a light raspberry and walnut vinaigrette dressing
09:36which on the label says all the flavor you could wish for.
09:40Sacrifice calories but not flavor.
09:44However, if you look at the fine print,
09:48oh, this is an eyesight test,
09:50there is red 40 and blue one.
09:53There's also natural color, so there's caramel color.
09:57The reason food companies use synthetic food dyes
10:00in something like this is that while raspberries are red,
10:04if you have it packaged in a product
10:06for a long period of time and if it goes
10:08through a processing like ultra processed manufacturing,
10:12it might lose a bit of that color through the process.
10:15So adding something like red 40 or blue one back in
10:18is gonna help it maintain the look and appeal.
10:21So obviously you can also get the food dyes themselves
10:25from the store for home baking or other kinds of decorating
10:29and we got them today.
10:31Here's what a few of them look like.
10:34And this is the packaging, food colors and egg dye,
10:39red, yellow and blue.
10:41So what do these contain exactly?
10:43This contains red 40 and red three.
10:47We have yellow, this contains yellow five and red 40
10:52and blue, this contains blue one and red 40.
10:57So California's governor Gavin Newsom plans to ban
11:00these dyes from snacks in public schools
11:03across the state as of 2027, which is a pretty big deal.
11:09The real benefit of synthetic dyes is economic.
11:13Compared to natural dyes, synthetic dyes are cheaper
11:16to manufacture, they are less susceptible
11:19to environmental factors, so they can be made
11:22and used anywhere.
11:23They're also easier to control,
11:25so they can be more reliable color agents
11:27and you have no risk of them fading.
11:31And the market for them is huge.
11:33Sales have grown nearly 10% from 2019 to 2023.
11:38Meanwhile, demand for natural dyes has increased 7%
11:42during that same time period.
11:45Today, those could be beets, beta carotene,
11:48cherries, strawberries, dried hibiscus flowers,
11:51cranberries, grapes, turmeric, paprika.
11:54All of these things that you know when you touch them,
11:57that color is gonna get on your fingers.
11:59So let's look at a few of them.
12:01Let's start with beets.
12:03I have cooked with beets before,
12:05and I can tell you this is a very effective dye.
12:09I'm gonna be very delicate about how I open this,
12:11so let's open this.
12:13Ooh, grip strength.
12:14Ugh!
12:15Oh my God, what the hell?
12:19Ha ha ha ha, Paige!
12:22Okay, take two.
12:24All right, now I have a jar opening glove.
12:29We'll see if this works.
12:31Absolutely mortifying if it doesn't work.
12:33Okay.
12:34Oh, it came off so easy.
12:37Would you look at that?
12:38The nice thing about a natural dye like beets as well
12:42is that it's packed full of vitamins and minerals
12:45that you want to get in your diet anyway.
12:47So obviously, in a food product,
12:50it's not gonna be that much,
12:52but it's a nicer thing to put in your body
12:54than something that could be a carcinogen.
12:57So looking at that juice,
13:00that looks like red dye to me,
13:02and I'm gonna touch it.
13:05So slightly more soluble than the kind of dye
13:08that I would imagine putting in food.
13:10Let's actually compare it to the red dye.
13:13Next to each other, they look pretty similar.
13:17This red sticks to the plate a little more.
13:18I can literally see it kind of lingering
13:21on the white of the plate
13:22in a slightly more synthetic way.
13:25Let's look at turmeric now.
13:28Turmeric is something that is really widely used
13:31in the food industry in Europe,
13:34and it's something that some US companies
13:36are starting to use in their products,
13:37including Kraft's macaroni and cheese.
13:40The nice thing about turmeric
13:41is that it does have anti-inflammatory properties.
13:43It's packed full of health benefits
13:45and void of some of the health risks
13:46that you apparently get in yellow five and yellow six,
13:50which have historically been used to dye foods yellow.
13:53So here are some products that actually use natural dyes
13:57instead of synthetic dyes.
14:00Now, obviously, these are ultra-processed products.
14:03They are not beacons of health
14:05by any stretch of the imagination,
14:07but it is interesting to see how something
14:10like an instant mashed potato
14:13with this distinctive yellow color on it
14:16uses natural dyes instead of the food dyes
14:19that the food industry does seem to be so attached to.
14:22So in this, for example,
14:24scrolling down the ingredients list,
14:26I can see annatto extract,
14:29which is a type of seed from Mexico,
14:32paprika extract that's also used for color,
14:35and those are the only colors in here.
14:38Obviously, it has some other chemicals
14:40that are used in ultra-processed foods.
14:42Now, these are really marketed as healthy,
14:45and I will say from a health perspective,
14:47not necessarily going to be delivering
14:49the kind of fiber and vegetables
14:51that you would get from just eating a carrot,
14:54but they don't have the food dyes
14:55that you might find in some other products.
14:58So this uses beetroot powder and turmeric extract
15:02to get these kinds of colors
15:03that you see on the front of the packet.
15:05So if you're trying to avoid food dyes in food,
15:09the number one thing you should look for
15:10is the USDA organic seal.
15:14Anything with that seal cannot contain synthetic food dyes.
15:18If there isn't an organic label,
15:20look on the ingredients,
15:22and it might be listed under a few different names.
15:25Typically, it will say something like F, D, and C,
15:29and then a number.
15:31FD&C means the Federal Food, Drug,
15:33and Cosmetic Act of 1938.
15:36It basically means that the number that's listed there
15:39has been put into the FDA's database,
15:42so it's something that's regulated by the FDA.
15:45So red number 40 is FD&C Red 40,
15:51and it might be listed under a few different names,
15:54and I'm actually going to read them
15:56because there are so many.
15:58So there's Red 40, Red 40 Lake,
16:02FD&C Red number 40,
16:06FD&C Red number 40 Aluminum Lake,
16:10Allura Red AC,
16:13CI Food Red 17,
16:16Red number...
16:19What is that?
16:21INS number 129 and E129.
16:25And then other products, it's the same thing.
16:28So Red number three might be FD&C number three
16:32or Red dye number three.
16:34Generally, you're looking for a color, a number,
16:37a few letters.
16:38It might give you a red flag.
16:41It's unclear how much synthetic food dye we consume
16:44because it's in so many products.
16:47It's likely a very small amount, but it is everywhere.
16:51I'm gonna eat it.
16:56It's great.
16:57I can't lie.
16:59Okay, I'll give you...
17:02I'm gonna take another drip.