Split cancer ruling befuddles the public

Top California court says three companies don't need to put warning labels on cereals 

The California Supreme Court has let three breakfast-cereal giants off the hook.

Last week's ruling that denied a review of an appellate decision means the corporations needn't put warning labels on boxes of their whole-grain cereals to the effect that an ingredient — acrylamide — might cause cancer.

The ruling came despite the chemical having been identified by federal and state agencies as a potential cause of the disease.

It left the public unsure what's real — or dangerous.

Bob Egelko

According to a story by Bob Egelko in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle, General Mills' Cheerios, Post's Grape-Nut Flakes and Kellogg's All Bran will not have to carry the red flags under the state's Proposition 65, a 1986 ballot measure requiring "businesses to notify the public when their products contain ingredients that have been shown to cause cancer or birth defects." 

At the same time as it left that ruling intact, the court's decision removed it as a legal precedent — which was a relief to attorney Joseph Mann, who'd argued on behalf of the Center for Environmental Health, the Center for Food Safety and other groups that the courts should limit the scope of the ruling.

The Chronicle story goes on to report that Mann, who earlier had said "the opinion is just dead wrong," maintains that making a cookie product with whole grains "doesn't mean [manufacturers] can jack it up with sugar and call it a health food, and say states can't regulate that."

The ruling, not incidentally, didn't mandate that warning labels should be required "for other food products that contain both healthy ingredients and possible carcinogens," Egelko writes.

Researchers way back in 2002 had detected the presence of acrylamide "as a byproduct of baking, roasting or frying carbohydrate-rich foods such as potato chips and French fries, both of which now carry Prop. 65 warning labels," the story says.

In response to the suit seeking the same labels for the cereals, "the Second District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles [in a 3-0 ruling in July] agreed with federal health officials who said that such warnings would cause more harm than good," the Chronicle story continues.

Why? 

Because, the story quotes the court, "requiring warnings on all foods containing acrylamide at levels that pose any risk of cancer 'would cause many otherwise healthful foods [such as peanut butter, rye and whole wheat bread, sunflower seeds and prune juice] to appear to consumers to be unhealthful.'"

More information on ingredients that may cause the disease can be found in "Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer," a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten, aimed at male caregivers.

Appeal expected on ruling on breakfast foods

Los Angeles court says industry doesn't need to put cancer warning labels on cereals 

There's a cereal war going on these days.

Between advocates of breakfast foods such as Grape-Nut flakes and Cheerios that contain whole grains and researchers who insist those cereals contain a chemical — acrylamide — that's a potential cause of cancer.

The latest shot in the skirmish, according to a story by Bob Egelko in the San Francisco Chronicle, came when a California court ruled recently that the breakfast cereals don't need cancer warnings.

The 3-0 ruling by the Second District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles said the cereals, produced by Post, General Mills and Kellogg, needn't heed Proposition 65, a right-to-know law state voters passed in 1986 that "requires businesses to notify the public when their products, or any substances they release into the environment, contain ingredients that have been shown to cause cancer or birth defects" because such labels might discourage consumers from buying healthy food.

A huge win for the cereal industry, the decision was based on 2003 and 2006 letters from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to state health officials claiming that warning labels "would mislead consumers and lead to health detriments."

Requiring warnings on all foods containing the chemical at levels that pose any risk of cancer, the court indicated, might harm the value of "peanut butter, rye and whole wheat bread, sunflower seeds, and prune juice," according to the Chronicle piece.

Justice Chaney

Another story, by Eric Schroeder on the Food Business News website, reports that Associate Justice Victoria Gerrard Chaney had said no Prop. 65 warning "should be placed on foods, including breakfast cereals, unless and until the science supports such a warning."

The court decision observed "that when the state sought to require Prop 65 warnings on canned tuna because it may contain harmful levels of mercury, an appeals court said California law was preempted because federal health officials were already advising consumers of tuna's benefits and possible risks."

The state Supreme Court, Egelko's story continued, "followed officials' directions in 2004 by refusing to allow Prop. 65 warnings on anti-smoking patches containing nicotine, which can cause fetal damage."

An appeal of the court ruling — in which a dismissal of a suit by Richard Sowinski, a retired Walnut Creek physician who'd sought to require Prop. 65 warnings on 59 cereals — was expected.

The ruling, not incidentally, means the court has rejected arguments that Prop. 65 warnings would encourage the companies to make safer cereals.

Federal agencies have listed acrylamide as a carcinogen, and it was placed on the Prop. 65 list in 1990.

In 2002, researchers learned the chemical was "a byproduct of baking, roasting or frying carbohydrate-rich foods such as potato chips and French fries — both of which now carry Prop. 65 warning labels — and cereals," the Chronicle story stated.

Acrylamide has also been the recent focus of whether warning labels are necessary on coffee packaging.

Details on other cancer risks can be found in "Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer," a VitalityPress book I, Woody Weingarten, aimed at male caregivers.