If you have been happily snarfing down chocolate in recent years, secure in the knowledge that those flavonols were at least doing good things for your heart, today is not your day.
Just in time for Valentine’s Day, a California consumer health watchdog group filed legal notices Wednesday demanding that many of the big chocolate companies post warnings on their packages that show their products contain high levels of lead and cadmium.
As You Sow, an Oakland nonprofit, says single servings of 26 products it tested contain more of the two harmful heavy metals than allowed under the Golden State’s Proposition 65 toxic chemical warning law. The list includes many of the big name producers of what is many people’s favorite food. Try not to weep.
“We are getting (lead and cadmium) from multiple sources,” Eleanne Van Vliet, director of toxic chemicals research for As You Sow, said. “The problem with those toxic heavy metals is they accumulate in the body. It’s terrible for adults, but especially for children.”
Lead can cause all kinds of health problems, including lowering children’s IQ. Cadmium is a carcinogen and can cause kidney and bone damage.
Now before you ask the boss to remove all the vending machines, let’s be clear that the chocolate companies and the association that represents them, are having none of this. They say there are, at worst, trace amounts of lead and cadmium in chocolate from natural sources and that regulators have rejected this argument before.
“The (Food and Drug Association) and many states monitor the amount of cadmium and lead in food. All Hershey products meet all FDA and state standards, and our cocoa powder and chocolate are safe to eat. This includes the very strict Proposition 65 standards for lead and cadmium in candy and other products,” Jeff Beckman, director of corporate communications for Hershey, said.
“People have been eating cocoa and chocolate for centuries with no evidence of a single incident of concern regarding these naturally occurring minerals,” Beckman added.
Van Vliet insists that As You Sow is not talking about tiny amounts; rather, she says, if you think about the amount of chocolate the average person consumes each year, these concentrations are worrisome.
If we could get them all in a room, both sides would probably agree on one thing: We do eat a lot of chocolate. According to one trade magazine, Americans consume about 9.5 pounds every year. That’s less than half the amount in world leader Switzerland, where the average person eats 19.8 pounds annually. The confectioners association’s data shows that the average American eats chocolate twice a week, with 89 percent of women and 85 percent of men saying they indulge at some point.
