Is the orange juice you're drinking contaminated?

Is the orange juice you’re drinking contaminated?

By Pat Benson

Jan. 12, 2012 12 AM PT

Does the orange juice you’re drinking have a fungicide in it?

The Food and Drug Administration says orange juice on the market is safe to drink. The FDA says it has no plans to remove products from store shelves after some juice imported from Brazil was found to contain small amounts of the fungicide carbendazim.

Coca-Cola Co. said Thursday that it was the company that alerted federal regulators to the fungicide in its orange juice and rival juices. The Food and Drug Administration says the levels of the chemical found by Coca-Cola are safe to drink, but that it is conducting its own tests.

Here’s an excerpt from the letter that Nega Beru, director of the Office of Food Safety for the FDA, sent to the executive director of the Juice Products Assn. (click here to read the complete letter):

“The Environmental Protection Agency has conducted a preliminary risk assessment based on the recent reports of carbendazim in orange juice. Based on that risk assessment, EPA has concluded that consumption of orange juice with carbendazim at the low levels that have been reported does not raise safety concerns. FDA does not intend to take action to remove from domestic commerce orange juice containing the reported low levels of carbendazim. FDA is, however, conducting its own testing of orange juice for carbendazim, and, if the agency identifies orange juice with carbendazim at levels that present a public health risk, it will alert the public and take the necessary action to ensure that the product is removed from the market.”

“This is an industry issue that affects every company that produces products in the U.S. using orange juice from Brazil,” Coca-Cola spokesman Dan Schafer told the Associated Press.

Orange juice futures were falling Thursday, heading for the biggest two-day drop in more than three years, as concerns eased that cold weather in Florida and the U.S probe into fungicide contamination will curb supplies.

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