SCF reviews carrageenan
released its opinion on the safety of carrageenan, mainly in
response to work published by Tobacman in October 2001, reports
Reading Scientific Services this week.
The European Commission's Scientific Committee on Food (SCF) has released its opinion on the safety of carrageenan, mainly in response to work published by Tobacman in October 2001, reports Reading Scientific Services this week.
The work questioned the safety of degraded carrageenan (poligeenan) which is known to cause haemorrhage and ulceration in some laboratory animals, and showed how a rise in rates of breast cancer was exactly mirrored by a rise in the consumption of carrageenan and other water soluble polymers in recent years.
The SCF dismissed the second point saying that a similar correlation might be found with any other dietary component or chemical to which there had been increasing exposure during the 20th century.
However, on the first point the SCF agreed that the specification for carrageenan should be tightened to ensure than any degraded carrageenan is kept to a minimum (not more than 5 per cent below 50 kDa).
In 1978, the Scientific Committee for Food (SCF) endorsed the Acceptable Daily Intake(ADI) of 0 - 75 mg/kg bw established for carrageenan by the Joint FAO/WHO ExpertCommittee on Food Additives (JECFA, 1974; SCF, 1978).
JECFA reviewed carrageenan again in 1984 and allocated an ADI 'not specified' for refined non-degraded carrageenan (JECFA, 1984a).
The SCF also reviewed carrageenan again in 1992, when further technological and toxicological information became available. At that time, the Committee concluded that it would be premature to adjust the ADI until the results of further studies then underway were available and it recommended that carrageenan should not be permitted in infant formulas which would constitute the entire food supply for the infant at that age period (SCF, 1994a).
