Devil's Food
Posted on 05/08/2002 4:48:40 PM PDT by GeneD
Filed at 7:27 p.m. ET
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- An environmental group sued chocolate manufacturers Wednesday, contending chocolate contains potentially hazardous levels of lead and cadmium and should carry warning labels.
The suit, by the nonprofit American Environmental Safety Institute, alleges chocolate products expose consumers -- especially children -- to potentially dangerous levels of the metals.
A state investigation last year discounted the lawsuit's claims, and U.S. Food and Drug Administration researchers have found children younger than 6 who eat lots of chocolate take in 6 percent or less of the total daily amount of lead allowable by law.
An attorney for the companies named in the suit -- including Hershey Foods Corp., Nestle USA Inc., Kraft Foods North America Inc. -- said the lawsuit was baseless and an attempt to extort a settlement.
The lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court seeks in part to force the firms to include warning labels on the products under a requirement of California's Proposition 65 that individuals be warned before they are exposed to dangerous chemicals.
Scientific testing found lead and cadmium levels in products like M&Ms presented ``a clear and present danger to the health of our children,'' said Roger Carrick, an attorney for the Palo Alto-based institute.
Michele Corash, an attorney for the chocolate companies, said the two metals are present naturally in chocolate and other food but in levels too low to pose any hazard.
``We will vigorously defend the safety of our products,'' Corash said. ``But our greater concern is getting the word out that these claims are totally without basis and are just designed to scare people.''
If I really need to know something about environmental health and safety, here's where I go: ACGIH.orgNo junk, just science.
If I really need to know something about environmental health and safety, here's where I go: ACGIH.org
No junk, just science.
Why not just sue the individual parents who give their young children so much chocolate? That would make more sense. But then, it's not about the children but about the money.
M&M's for example, are at about 1/333 of the allowable level. Hershey's cocoa powder is at about 1/140th the level. Technically, under California law, they are required to be labeled, but they are not actually unsafe.
There is a concern about the way cocoa is processed. One cocoa bean might have 12 times the lead as another one. The lead doesn't get into the cocoa naturally, it is harvested in latin american countries that use leaded gasoline, as well as lead based pesticides.
It is an interesting fact to know, and I would prefer a lower leaded chocolate than not, but again, these levels while "high" are considered not too harmful.
Devil's Food
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