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February 7th, 2023
Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) and other Democratic lawmakers are again pressuring the Food and Drug Administration to limit heavy metals, including lead and arsenic, in baby foods. It’s amazing to write this sentence. Lead and arsenic are well-known to damage brain tissue and other organ systems, lower IQ, slow development, and create other serious health problems, particularly among the developing – you know, like babies. And yet here we are, in 2023, where the U.S. market still allows these neurotoxins to exist in not just food, but baby food!
According to Senator Duckworth’s recent letter to the agency, the FDA has made “little tangible progress” in its “Closer to Zero” action plan to reduce the amounts of lead, arsenic, cadmium, and other heavy metals in baby foods. Duckworth was joined in her letter by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), and Rep. Tony Cárdenas (D-Calif.). The group called on the FDA to quickly finalize proposed action levels, and “continue working to fulfill, if not expedite” the other phases of Closer to Zero, including drafting limits for arsenic, cadmium, and mercury (mercury for Heaven’s sake!) in baby foods.
Baby food contamination is nothing new. Manufacturers and the FDA known about these dangers for decades. Still, nothing appears to have been done. A recent investigation and accredited laboratory analysis of 33 baby food products by Bloomberg Law revealed that 32 of these products contained at least two of three heavy metals: lead, arsenic, and cadmium.
Our national intellect has been utterly ravaged by leaded gasoline, the impacts of which are being heavily felt amongst the elderly generations that were regularly exposed to it. We, as a nation, can ill afford to repeat the sins of our corporate fathers by allowing this food contamination to continue. Here’s wishing Senator Duckworth and her colleagues success in finally putting a stop to this.
