Do You And Your Family Eat Toxic Food Dyes?

Food dyes are one of the most widely used and dangerous additives. While the European Union has recently placed regulations on labeling food dyes to inform consumers of the health risks, the United States has no such requirement.

Here are some of the most common food dyes used today, according to the Food Freedom Network:

BLUE #1 (BRILLIANT BLUE) An unpublished study suggested the possibility that Blue 1 caused kidney tumors in mice. What it's in: Baked goods, beverages, desert powers, candies, cereal, drugs, and other products.

BLUE #2 (INDIGO CARMINE) Causes a statistically significant incidence of tumors, particularly brain gliomas, in male rats. What it's in: Colored beverages, candies, pet food.

CITRUS RED #2 It's toxic to rodents at modest levels and caused tumors of the urinary ladder and possible other organs. What it's in: Skins of Florida oranges.

GREEN #3 (FAST GREEN) Caused significant increases in bladder and testes tumors in male rats. What it's in: Drugs, personal care products, cosmetic products except in eye areas, candies, beverages, ice cream, sorbet, ingested drugs, lipsticks, and externally applied cosmetics.

RED #3 (ERYTHROSINE) Recognized in 1990 by the FDA as a thyroid carcinogen in animals and is banned in cosmetics and externally applied drugs. What it's in: Sausage casings, oral medication, maraschino cherries, baked goods, candies.

RED #40 (ALLURA RED) This is the most widely used and consumed dye. It may accelerate the appearance of immune system tumors in mice. It also causes hypersensitivity (allergy-like) reactions in some consumers and mighty trigger hyperactivity in children. What it's in: Beverages, bakery goods, dessert powers, candies, cereals, foods, drugs and cosmetics.

YELLOW #5 (TARTRAZINE) Yellow 5 causes sometimes severe hypersensitivity reactions and might trigger hyperactivity and other behavioral effects in children. What it's in: Pet foods, numerous bakery goods, beverages, dessert powers, candies, cereals, gelatin desserts.

YELLOW #6 (SUNSET YELLOW) Caused adrenal tumors in animals and occasionally causes severe hypersensitivity reactions. What it's in: Color bakery goods, cereals, beverages, dessert powers, candies, gelatin deserts, sausages,cosmetics and drugs.

In CSPI's summary of studies on food dyes, you can see that some of the most commonly used food dyes may be linked to numerous forms of cancer. CSPI reported: "THE THREE MOST WIDELY USED DYES, RED 40, YELLOW 5 AND YELLOW 6 ARE CONTAMINATED WITH KNOW CARCINOGENS. ANOTHER DYE, RED 3, HAS BEEN ACKNOWLEDGED FOR YEARS BY THE FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION TO BE A CARCINOGEN, YET IS STILL IN THE FOOD SUPPLY."

Every year, food manufacturers pour 15 million pounds of artificial food dyes into U S foods-and that amount only factors in eight different varieties, according to the Center for Science in the Cublic Interest (CSPI).

These dyes are so common in U.S. foods-especially kids' foods-that parents don't think twice about giving their children rainbow colored cereal or fluorescent blue "juice," and adults don't consider bright orange cheese puffs out of the ordinary.

Take one carefully designed, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study published in the journal, The Lancet. It concluded that a variety of common food dyes, and the preservative sodium benzoate-found in many soft drinks, fruit juices and salad dressings-do in fact cause some children to become measurably more hyperactive and distractible.

THE STUDY ALSO FOUND THAT THE E-NUMBERED FOOD DYES DO AS MUCH DAMAGE TO CHILDREN'S BRAINS AS LEAD IN GASOLINE, RESULTING IN A SIGNIFICANT REDUCTION IN IQ.

The diet should include a range of vibrantly colored foods, but these foods should be the ones that are NATURALLY rich in color. Red bell peppers, purple eggplant, green spinach, blueberries, and rainbow chard are all examples of healthy foods whose bright colors are signs of the important nutrients they contain.

These are the food colors you need in your diet, not the man made varieties found in most processed foods. The good news is avoiding artificial food dyes is incredibly easy-just stick to whole fresh foods and avoid the processed ones!