CITY HALL — The chairman of the City Council's Health Committee is calling for public hearings on a food-whitening additive used in some breads that's suspected of causing cancer.
Ald. George Cardenas (12th), chairman of the Committee on Health and Environmental Protection, submitted a resolution at Wednesday's City Council meeting calling for hearings on azodicarbonamide.
That food whitener, he charged, "has been linked to serious health risks in laboratory animals, including fetal death, cleft palates, skeletal deformation and other birth defects, cancer and damage to brain and kidneys."
The resolution cites Pillsbury products, Little Debbie snacks and Wonder Bread. Wonder Bread's corporate owner said it has removed the substance, also known as ADA, even though some packaging still lists it as an ingredient.
General Mills, owner of Pillsbury, issued a statement saying: "The safety and quality of our products is our top priority. This is a common ingredient that is approved for safe use in food by the Food and Drug Administration."
A U.S. FDA Web page on the substance states that the food whitener breaks down into semicarbizide during baking, and that "has been shown to increase the incident of tumors when fed to female mice, but not to male mice or either gender of rat."
The FDA concluded that the lab tests used quantities far beyond normal human exposure, and, for now, it "is not recommending that consumers change their diets."
The City Council resolution points out the FDA "has agreed that further studies are required to continue to evaluate the safe use of azodicarbonamide and semicarbizide in food."
The resolution states that the United Kingdom has banned ADA as a "possible cause of asthma" and the World Health Organization also has tied it to asthma and skin irritations at places where it's manufactured. The resolution adds that New York state is considering banning it in baked goods.
The Subway sandwich chain removed it from its bread earlier this year after the Food Babe blog drew attention to it.
McKee Foods, owner of Little Debbie, did not respond to requests for comment. Wonder Bread owner Flowers Foods has removed azodicarbonamide from its Nature's Own brands.
Azodicarbonamide is also called the "yoga mat chemical," because it's used in the production of spongy yoga mats and rubber shoe soles.
A report earlier this year from the Environmental Working Group found azodicarbonamide in almost 500 food products, including Pillsbury dinner dolls and toaster strudel, Little Debbie snacks and Wonder Bread.
"Azodicarbonamide (ADA) is an FDA-approved food additive," said Mary Krier, spokeswoman for Flowers Foods, in an email. "In response to consumer concerns regarding ADA, we began eliminating it from our products in mid-2013. Wonder products do not contain ADA."
However, "because we are using up existing packaging inventory, the packaging of Wonder products in some markets may still cite ADA in the ingredient list, even though the product no longer contains the ingredient," she said. "Updated packaging will appear in markets once the existing inventory has been used."
The resolution calls for hearings and urges "the food industry to avoid using azodicarbonamide in food products."
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