Get Rid of "May Contain..."Statements on Food Labels

THE FDA (Food and Drug Administration) is holding a public hearing today from 9 am to 4:30 pm to discuss clearing up vague statements on food labels. Hallelujah! Ever since the 2004 Food Labelling law went into effect, we have been bombarded with statements like, "may contain peanuts", "manufactured in a facility that uses eggs", processed on the same line as products containing dairy". These read to me like "don't sue us if someone has a reaction after eating our product". Vague statements are not helpful and downright confusing. Because of the 2004 law, we can now read a label and clearly see statements like "contains milk". That makes much more sense to most consumers than the word "whey" (which is from milk) in the middle of an ingredient list.

That said, there is more to do to make things clearer for those of us who purchase food. Food manufacturers should be able to be clear about what is, and what isn't, in the foods they sell. Most people recognize that there is no such thing as a 100% guarantee, but we need accurate, helpful information to make the best decisions possible.

You can read about the purpose of the FDA hearing here:
http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~lrd/fr080808.html

I'll keep you posted about the results.

Posted in: FDA,food labels,may contain statements