American Notes HEALTH

Will canned fruit cocktail be the same without its rosy cherries? How about candy canes without their crimson stripes? Some cheeses minus their red-wax coating? After eight years of debate, the Food and Drug Administration banned Red Dye No. 3, an ingredient in all of the above and in some cosmetics. Though extremely high doses of the coloring have induced thyroid tumors in laboratory rats, the food industry insists that the risk to consumers is negligible. Oddly enough, the FDA agrees. But it was forced to ban the dye, for which there is no good substitute, under a 30-year-old statute mandating that additives with even the slightest hint of a cancer risk be outlawed. Said Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan: "Today's action is yet another reminder of the need for Congress to consider updating the law."