Have an allergy? Food labeling guidelines changing..

[TreasonousBastard]

"highly refined" peanut oil, anyone?

https://blogs.webmd.com/food-fitness/20200604/have-a-food-allergy-what-to-know-about-the-new-relaxed-labeling-guidelines

The FDA recently announced that it’s relaxing some food labeling requirements because of the COVID-19 pandemic. With supply chains disrupted, they want to make it easier for manufacturers who can’t find the ingredients they need to make substitutions--without changing the ingredient list or food label.

Rest assured that manufacturers can’t suddenly introduce a Top 8 allergen (milk, eggs, fish, shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, and soybeans) without updating labeling. The change can’t significantly alter the nutrition, and has to be minor (two percent or less by weight).

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But if you’re someone with an allergy or intolerance outside those Top 8, this is probably making you nervous--and for good reason. Allergies to sesame, buckwheat, and mustard also affect people and are considered major allergens in other parts of the world. Yet, some of these ingredients may end up being used as swaps: The FDA’s guidelines merely say that food manufacturers “should avoid” substitutions that could cause safety issues. That’s “dangerously vague,” as David Bloom, CEO of SnackSafely.com points out, and sounds more like a suggestion than a requirement.

Another potential risk: “Highly-refined” oils. Because they’ve heavily processed and stripped of protein, the FDA doesn’t consider them allergenic--even though some people with allergies still react to them and avoid products made with them. With the new guidance, a company could substitute highly-refined peanut oil for canola oil but not show that change on the ingredient list.

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[wackadoo wabbit]

1. Seriously? Not show a change of ingredients on the ingredient list?

So ingredient lists will no longer be accurate?

[Rhiannon12866]

2. K&R! Important news! Thanks so much for posting!

[GreenPartyVoter]

3. They should be adding things to the list. My son is allergic to mustard. Narrowly missed having

to go to the ER. Definitely getting epipens.

[Warpy]

4. I can't call it an allergy, but canola oil is Satanic stuff

that causes a volcano under my sternum to erupt every time I eat something with that stuff in it.

I'm going to be very unhappy to find it in my Brand X peanut butter that doesn't list it on the label.

[eppur_se_muova]

5. Better to send a few people to the hospital than to set up new labels ?

Packaging and printing is highly automated -- this is just a penny-pinching abdication of responsibility, excused by an administration to whom "responsibility" is a totally alien concept.

[TreasonousBastard]

6. Their excuse (and it makes a little sense) is that you print the labels in a batch and...

glue them to the bottles. Having to change the labels because ingredients could change daily, or hourly, could cause too much trouble and interrupt the line.

Well, get on it then. Find a way to change labels faster. If anyone's ever seen a cannery or bottling plant in action, it is amazing-- the unheralded geniuses who designed that stuff shouldn't have a problem with this. Companies just don't want to spend the money until forced to.

[eppur_se_muova]

7. Yep, that's it. Anyone who's watched an episode of "How It's Mode" can tell it's just an excuse. nt