State’s Fruit Growers Fight Red-Dye Ban : FDA’s Prohibition of Use in Cosmetics, Then Cherries, Feared

Rep. Vic Fazio (D-Sacramento) is leading a drive on behalf of California fruit growers to block an expected government ban on use of what some scientists consider a potentially cancer-causing red dye in cosmetics.

Growers, who use the substance--known as Red Dye No. 3--extensively in canned cherries, argue that banning it in cosmetics would quickly lead to a ban on its use in fruit, with potentially damaging impact on their sales.

At Fazio’s urging, the House Appropriations Committee on Thursday approved language requiring the Food and Drug Administration to conduct a long-term study of the effects of Red Dye No. 3 before removing it from the marketplace.

The move has stirred sharp opposition from public interest groups. The Public Citizen Litigation Group, a watchdog organization founded by Ralph Nader, denounced the vote as “a secret attempt to influence public policy” and allow what it said is a harmful food, drug and cosmetic dye to remain on the market.

Red Dye No. 3 is widely used to tint cosmetics, drugs and foods, but is most widely known as the coloring agent in maraschino cherries. In a recent 12-month period, nearly 600,000 pounds of the dye was stirred into everything from pills to lipstick.

In 1984, the FDA learned that the dye induced cancerous tumors in laboratory rats. The agency moved to ban its use. But the proposed ban was quickly overturned by then-Health and Human Services Secretary Margaret Heckler. More recently, a study at the University of Massachusetts suggested that the dye does not promote the development of cancer cells.

Last April, however, the FDA announced once again that it would move to ban use of Red Dye No. 3 in cosmetics and drugs. FDA Commissioner Frank E. Young delayed implementation of the decision for six months.

But fruit growers, fearing that red dye next will be banned in their products, descended on Capitol Hill to make their case.

For many California fruit growers, the maraschino cherry is the key to economic prosperity. Marketing studies have shown that when the vibrant red fruit is omitted from canned fruit cocktail, consumers stay away in droves.

Such a decline in consumer demand could, for instance, result in a 20,000-ton loss in the market for pears, which are an important ingredient in canned fruit cocktail. Pear growers across the nation could lose as much as $220 million a year. For fruit growers in California, and especially in Fazio’s pear-growing Sacramento district, opponents of the ban say such a drop in demand would wreak economic havoc.

“We’re acting prematurely if we’re starting to ban a product that the FDA commissioner has concluded is not a health problem,” Fazio said Friday. He added that in a recent meeting with members of Congress, Young said he was under political pressure to make the decision and appealed for congressional support of further study.

Fazio said his amendment, which was included in the congressional report that accompanies the 1990 appropriations bill, is likely to prevail when the House votes on the bill Wednesday. Critics said the inclusion of the provision in the House report--rather than in the bill--has made it both less visible and more difficult to overturn.

Unless the language is actively opposed in the Senate, it is likely to deflect any further attempts to ban use of the dye for three to five years. Young’s April decision to ban its use in cosmetics would also be put on hold until the study--to be funded by the food, drug and cosmetic industries--is complete.

“The food industry has secretly attempted to influence public policy through a committee report in the face of the reality that Congress would never vote to leave a cancer-causing . . . dye on the market,” said William B. Schultz, an attorney with the Nader group.

“This is an end-run around the democratic process and the FDA commissioner who had concluded that he was legally required to ban Red Dye No. 3,” Schultz said.