FDA Bans Red No. 3, the Artificial Coloring in Many Products

Red No. 3 is used as bright red artificial coloring in candy, cereal, fruit cocktails, strawberry-flavored milkshakes, and other foods and beverages. It’s ubiquitous. And so it’s alarming that data has surfaced that the dye can cause cancer in lab animals; specifically, evidence reveals that lab male rats exposed to heightened Red No. 3 levels developed cancer.

The FDA recently banned use of Red No. 3, but the Center for Science in the Public Interest has commented that it exists in thousands of—a whopping 9200—products. Notably, the FDA isn’t banning Red No. 40, another artificial dye linked to problems, specifically behavioral ones, in kids.

Food manufacturers can take until Jan. 15, 2027, to reformulate their products, which means consumers should be alert to ingredient lists and avoid products with Red No. 3. Those manufacturers of ingested drugs that include Red No. 3 such as supplements have until January 15, 2028.

Many consumer advocacy groups have asked the FDA to institute such a decision for quite some time due to the potential harm inflicted on children, both behavioral problems and cancer. The red synthetic dye has already been illegal for lipstick use since 1990 under a law that requires banning of those food additives that have been determined to cause cancer.

When you consume food products, you assume that they are reasonably safe. However, products that include additives associated with cancer may be unsafe and may cause serious harms. It can be appropriate, if you were diagnosed with cancer caused by additives, to sue for compensation. Food may be defective in terms of design, marketing, and manufacturing. Generally, design flaws in food have to do with how they were formulated; they exist in every unit of a product. Manufacturing flaws in food, on the other hand, typically occur only in certain batches of units since they involve errors in how the food was made (deviations from the recipe or formulary). Marketing defects typically involve a failure to provide adequate warnings.

If we can establish a manufacturer’s liability for food that contained Red No. 3 and caused cancer, we may be able to recover both economic and noneconomic damages. Economic damages include wage loss, medical bills, out of pocket costs. And replacement services such as the cost of hiring someone to perform household tasks or childcare because you no longer can. Noneconomic damages include any intangible losses that with reasonable certainty are the result of additive-caused cancer such as pain and suffering, mental anguish, loss of consortium, and loss of earning capacity. When cancer leads to death, it can result in various losses for the family. It may be appropriate for family members to bring a wrongful death lawsuit if a loved one died due to cancer caused by Red No. 3.

If you developed cancer and believe it may have been due to consumption of Red No. 3 or another food additive that’s associated with cancer, you should call our seasoned Chicago-based product liability lawyers. Contact us via our online form or call us at 312.462.1700.