Apples and Alar

The federal government thinks that it may ultimately ban the chemical Alar because long-term exposure may cause cancer. But it also believes that the levels found on apples today is not hazardous and the fruit is safe to eat. That sounds like a sensible position to us. But the government must do a better job of communicating what it is doing, and the public can’t expect easy answers in a complex, chemical society.

The Environmental Protection Agency caused most of the confusion by first announcing in 1986 that it planned to ban Alar because it caused cancer in laboratory rats; then the EPA backed off. Later, the agency took preliminary steps to ban Alar, the brand name for daminozide, made by Uniroyal. But it said that the chemical could be used until 1990, because traces found in the food supply were no threat to humans.

The actions seem inherently contradictory because the government failed to explain itself fully. The environmental agency can move against a chemical only when it has supportive scientific evidence and follows legal procedures that allow manufacturers and chemical users to make their case for leaving it on the market. Environmentalists are under no such constraints. In the case of Alar, the evidence indicates that both the government and the environmentalists are right--Alar probably should be banned. But the American public, seeking easy answers and reassurances that the food supply is safe, grasped the environmentalists’ point of view far more readily than that of the government.

School district bans on apples in cafeteria lunches only magnified public fears. The Alar issue is hardly new; there had been plenty of time for school dietitians to consult with health and science experts before the recent Natural Resources Defense Council report focused new attention on Alar. Even if school officials had not kept pace with the Alar controversy as it unfolded, they should have sought expert advice before ruling apples off the menu.

Checking the facts reveals that Alar is not used on apples grown in California. It is used now on only 5% of the whole crop--mainly Red Delicious, Staymen and McIntosh apples from Washington state. Farmers there find Alar useful not only because it produces more uniform fruit, but also because so many apples ripen at once that anything that helps keep the fruit on the tree longer, as Alar does, makes for an easier harvest.

Alar may pose a long-term cumulative cancer risk, especially to children who eat many apples and apple products while their bodies are small and therefore have a lower tolerance for the chemical. Tests show, however, that the current residue levels are not unduly hazardous. What is hazardous is the failure of the government to act with more dispatch and clarity on the issue and the failure of the public to understand that it won’t always get the easy answers it would like.