When you next visit a Kentucky Fried Chicken eatery in California, you will encounter something new: a warning label proclaiming that KFC French fries, baked potatoes, and chips "contain acylamide, a chemical known to the state of California to cause cancer."
KFC and other fast food establishments had been sued by California's Attorney General's office (under the state's Prop 65 regulations) for failure to warn consumers about "carcinogens" -- so they decided to end the controversy by slapping on a label. The general counsel of KFC even seemed happy about this, noting that it was a "win-win" move.
Win-win for whom? For the California Attorney General, perhaps, and for anti-science advocacy groups calling themselves "environmental goups." But certainly not for consumers or for the advancement of sound science.
Acrylamide is formed naturally when high-starch foods are cooked at high temperatures. Acrylamide in high dose causes cancer in laboratory rodents -- and the state's Prop 65 requires that chemicals which California has categorized as "carcinogens" (almost always based on such animal lab testing) be either banned or labeled. There are other outrageous examples of cancer labeling in California (you see such labels at gas pumps, on the exteriors of office buildings, on artificial fire logs, and elsewhere), but labeling potato products as containing "cancer causing agents" is particularly absurd because not only do myriad natural chemical constituents in food cause cancer in the laboratory (see ACSH's "Holiday Dinner Menu"), but cooked potato products are only one of many items on the FDA's list of acrylamide-containing foods. Other foods with relatively high levels of acrylamide include soft bread, cereals, biscuits, cookies, pretzels, coffee, and black olives. And there is no evidence whatsoever from human observations that acrylamide in foods contributes in any way to the causation of cancer.
Why did California single out potatoes served at fast food restaurants (as opposed to all eateries) as the target for a lawsuit? Surely French fries are among the most politically incorrect foods of our time -- so that made them an easy target. But baked potatoes, too? What are the people at KFC (and the other defendants in this case, including McDonald's and Frito-Lay) going to do when the next wave of threats is issued -- and cancer warning labels are demanded for basically every item they sell?
And where is the outrage from California scientists and public health officials as this scientific travesty unfolds?
Dr. Elizabeth M. Whelan is president of the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH.org, HealthFactsAndFears.com).
See also: ACSH's full report on Acrylamide in Food.
