Organic News
Artificial additives as harmful as leaded petrol for children
Artificial food colours could be removed from hundreds of products after a team of university researchers warned they were doing as much damage to children's brains as lead in petrol.
Scientists from Southampton University in the UK who carried out a study into seven additives for the Food Standards Agency (FSA), said children's development was being significantly damaged by E-numbers. After receiving the advice last month, officials at the FSA have advised their directors to call for the food industry to remove six additives named in the study by the end of next year.
The £750,000 study for the FSA suggested seven colourings, including tartrazine and sunset yellow, could also affect children's intelligence by up to five IQ points.
Researchers have linked E-numbers to behavioral problems since the 1970s but the debate has intensified after the Southampton study, published last September, found that seven additives were causing temper tantrums among normal children.
The additives linked to hyperactive behaviour are:
- Tartrazine (E102): Yellow food colouring found in mushy peas and candy floss, banned from all foods and drinks for under-threes.
- Quinoline yellow (E104): Food colouring found in squash, flu capsules.
- Suset yellow (E110): Orange yellow colouring found in bubble gum and jelly babies.
- Carmoisine (E122): Red food colouring found in throat lozenges.
- Ponceau 4R (E124): Red food colouring found in pear drops and bombay mix.
- Allura red (E129): Red food colouring found in fruit jelly sweets and lollipops.
- Sodium benzoate (E211): Artificial preservative found in squash, fizzy drinks and cough syrup.
