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FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

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Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#111
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It was a clear and flagrant abuse of the "may contain traces" mechanism. The bakeries caused harm for consumers as a way to avoid the coats of doing business safely. My view is that the business should be able to decide who they want to service or not. According to recent US studies, 0.2% of the population have a noticeable allergy to sesame. Seems like bakeries don't want to invest money for such a small percentag…

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oh please, there are plenty of first world countries without as many retarded regulations

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#112
post #93
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to have worked for gluten, at least. i.e. Consumers look for "gluten free" labelling rather than "This product contains gluten" labelling. If I were the FDA I'd standardize the nutrition label to have a clearly labelled allergen section in which you can reliably use to check that the product is free of X allergen. Of course a naive implementation of this would mean that water bottles and stuff will have a big l…

“Gluten free” is a little different because gluten is a protein not only found in wheat, but also wheat derivatives like spelt, semolina, graham, and other grains like barley, rye, and malt. This is different from a wheat allergy, in fact, its also not an “allergen” in the same way that peanuts are (digestive problems vs anaphylaxis), and would probably be better classified as an intolerance similar to lactose (which…

Gluten is an allergen for people with celiac, just not IgE-mediated. Celiac shouldn't be classified with lactose intolerance, it's much more serious, arguably more dangerous then even IgE-mediated allergies.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#113
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is pretty funny, in a really sad way.

It's evil.

The bakers cannot eliminate the risk of certain production lines from having cross contamination with any reasonable amount of money (like they would need to redo entire factories). So, for those products they introduce the contaminant on purpose to ensure all products that they cannot eliminate the risk for get labeled reduce the chance of someone dying from eating it.

Now I'm not saying thats what they did, perhaps they were scumbags, but its possible they did try to do what I said above and had the best intentions.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#114
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It was a clear and flagrant abuse of the "may contain traces" mechanism. The bakeries caused harm for consumers as a way to avoid the coats of doing business safely. My view is that the business should be able to decide who they want to service or not. According to recent US studies, 0.2% of the population have a noticeable allergy to sesame. Seems like bakeries don't want to invest money for such a small percentag…

The number might be 0.2% for just sesame, but roughly 10% of Americans have some form of allergy[0]. I'm guessing the reasoning here is to attempt to prevent "allergen creep", where the endgame would be major manufacturers throwing their hands up and listing most products as possibly containing many allergens (or, as in this case, intentionally introducing unnecessary ingredients). If this were to happen, we would ex…

even if it were 10%, we shouldn't expect 90% of consumers to subsidize the other 10%

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#115

This seems like splitting hairs on the part of the FDA. FDA officials acknowledged Tuesday that statements that a product “may contain” certain allergens “could be considered truthful and not misleading.” Bimbo officials have until July 8 to identify steps taken to remedy the issue — or to explain why the labeling doesn't violate FDA standards. So a baker.. who adds (insert allergy ingredient here), in minute quantit…

America has decided that able-bodied consumers should subsidize people with disabilities; companies are generally expected to make their products accessible even if there's not enough market demand for that to be profitable.

Food allergies are a disability. Some people with food allergies cannot consume sesame.

If you're a baker selling bread where sesame is not an ingredient, slapping "this product may contain sesame on your entire product line" or deliberately introducing sesame seeds into your recipe means a large part of the grocery store is inaccessible to people with a sesame seed allergy.

I don't think that's equitable. Imagine if every company that didn't want to cater to people in wheelchairs only rented office space in historical buildings that couldn't have wheelchair ramps installed.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#116
post #34

At this point it seems like it might be more effective to mandate the opposite: labels that indicate that the product is allergen free for X class of allergen. That way the default (no label) = might contain allergens, and the presence of the label guarantees your safety. Companies that take allergen cross contamination seriously can tout the label (and win the business of the allergic), companies that don't won't re…

It's an interesting idea, but the end result would probably be less options for people with allergies (unless they risk foods that appear to be safe, but lack the label.) We already have this type of labelling for gluten free foods, and one common complaint in the celiac community is that gluten should also be a major allergen. This would help greatly in deciding if a product is safe for people with celiac, since man…

> one common complaint in the celiac community is that gluten should also be a major allergen

As a point of interest, most of the developed world already requires labeling gluten as a major allergen. The US is the outlier / laggard.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#117
My understanding is this allergen over-labeling was inspired by the FDA in the first place. https://www.fastcompany.com/90830854/sesame-seed-allergen-fd...

From the linked article (from Jan 2023):

  But sesame does differ in one distinct way from eggs, peanuts, shellfish, milk, and soy: The seeds are teeny tiny and hard to keep track of. This means they’re prone to “cross-contamination,” in food-allergy terms. If you operate a bakery that makes sesame bagels, the odds are decent that rogue seeds will end up in your other products, too. Bad news for people with severe sesame allergies. But it’s also expensive and frustrating for food manufacturers to ensure the seeds are kept away from other foods, if they’re on the FDA’s major allergens list.
  
  Advocates have therefore been warning since December that the FASTER Act is poised to have a counter effect. Rather than minimize cross-contamination, as they argue the law requires, many big food brands have opted to add sesame to their bread products, then simply declare it as an ingredient. They are intentionally adding sesame flour to “avoid complying with the spirit and intent of the FASTER Act,” FARE tells Fast Company. That is cheaper than certifying that their facilities are 100% sesame-free.

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a very odd take to me given the focus of the article is that companies are explicitly saying "If you have severe allergies, don't buy this product", but the FDA is saying this isn't good enough. That is, the whole focus of the article is that these companies don't want to sell to consumers who may have severe allergies. Honestly, I side with the companies on this one. It's just a matter of incentives - if the…

I agree that the FDA got this one wrong and it's just better to have companies add the allergen than just put on a "maybe" label. The problem with making it okay to just put a "this may or may not kill you" label on products is that more and more companies will do it just to shield themselves from liability regardless of what is in their foods (it's cheaper to add a label and not add an unnecessary ingredient than to…

whether it is smart or not depends on the likelihood of it. do you have numbers?

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#119
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It takes guts to keep the brand name in English-speaking contries, though. I think they mostly only sell bimbo-branded goods in spanish language shops (where the brand would help sell). In, say, Safeway you only see the US brands they have acquired, at least where I live.

They actually have the Bimbo brand on the soccer jerseys for the Philadelphia Union which probably isn't good for the team's jersey sales.

Bimbo-core is actually on trend right now

Re: FDA warns top U.S. bakery not to claim foods contain allergens when they don't

#120
post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It takes guts to keep the brand name in English-speaking contries, though. I think they mostly only sell bimbo-branded goods in spanish language shops (where the brand would help sell). In, say, Safeway you only see the US brands they have acquired, at least where I live.

They actually have the Bimbo brand on the soccer jerseys for the Philadelphia Union which probably isn't good for the team's jersey sales.

They sell you a jersey for $300 and still put advertising logos?
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