UK thumbs up for Quorn
alternative product Quorn this week when the UK Food Standards
Agency (FSA) rejected claims by an American organisation that the
mycoprotein Quorn is unsafe.
The UK joined the ongoing and heated debate about the meat alternative product Quorn this week when the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) rejected claims by an American organisation that the mycoprotein Quorn is unsafe.
Last month the US Centre for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) had asked the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to stop marketing Quorn products and direct its parent company, Britain's Marlow Foods, to recall all the products from supermarkets. The move followed reports from American and European consumers that they had experienced adverse reactions after eating Quorn foods, which are made primarily from myco-protein, a vegetable protein.
But Food Standards Agency Director of Food Safety Policy Jon Bell told the CSPI: "Any protein containing food has the potential to cause an allergic reaction. When Quorn was approved for use in the UK some 15 years ago it was first in trial in the company's restaurant and then in one region of the UK. Allergy clinics were asked to report any change in the normal pattern of food intolerance with which they were dealing at that time. As a result of these studies it was known that there was a low level of intolerance to the product amongst the UK population."
"In a further study carried out in 1994 this was put at 1 in 200,000 so the latest figure of 1 in 146,000 is not unexpected and would not appear to change the position in any significant way. Given this level of intolerance and the fact that some 13 million units of this product were sold in 2000 alone it is not really surprising that you have been able to find people who appear to be intolerant to it."
"However, it is important to recognise that several commonly consumed foods and food ingredients have much higher intolerance levels than this. For example, the intolerance to soya is reported to be 1 in 300 and that to shellfish, even higher."
In a statement this week the FSA said that on present evidence, the tolerance of 1 in 146,000, it would not prevent people from enjoying the Quorn product and the UK consumer will still be able to purchase the meat alternative.
