Food Additives

U.S. health officials will test more food additives for melamine, a substance found in pet food linked to the deaths of at least 16 cats and dogs. Tests will be expanded to imports of six food additives, including soy protein, rice bran and corn gluten, Stephen Sundlof, director of the Center for Veterinary Medicine at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, said in a news conference. The FDA is already testing wheat gluten and rice protein for the substance.

The Food and Drug Administration has issued a warning letter to pet food maker Iams Co. about an additive in some of its products for overweight dogs and cats. The letter, dated Jan. 8 and posted on the FDA website Thursday, said that several Eukanuba-brand dry and canned pet food products made by Iams, a unit of Procter & Gamble Co., contain chromium tripicolinate, which is allowed as a source of supplemental chromium only in swine feed.

EVER wonder what goes into a bottle of wine? The story winemakers love to tell on the bottle label is one of a mystical alchemy of climate, soils, ancient practices and long traditions. Wine labels tend to focus on romance; the small amount of government-mandated information includes the percentage of alcohol, a warning against consuming wine when pregnant or driving, and a disclosure of sulfites.

If you want to get rid of a pest, why not use a littler pest to plague it? That's the tack OKd last week by the Food and Drug Administration, which has for the first time approved the use of bacteria-eating viruses as an additive to foods. From now on, these viruses -- known as bacteriophage or phage -- can be sprayed on ready-to-eat cold cuts and luncheon meats by manufacturers to prevent listeriosis, the most deadly of all food-borne illnesses in this country.

In a grocery store, looks can deceive. This is a place where natural yellow competes with Yellow No. 5 and past-their-prime apples keep a waxy shine. Even the color of meat can be misleading. In recent years, food companies have been pumping up the red color in hamburger, steaks, tuna and pork products by packaging meat in a mixture of carbon dioxide, nitrogen and a tiny amount of carbon monoxide.

First, there were healthy "margarine-like" spreads. Then came orange juice, followed by yogurt, granola bars, rice "milk," cheese and, now, chocolate bars. A growing number of popular foods are fortified with sterols and stanols, natural plant substances that lower the so-called bad cholesterol -- low density lipoprotein (LDL) -- by 10% to 15%.

Proponents of natural foods have long suspected that artificial colorings and preservatives may be unhealthful. Now British researchers have found that the additives can drive hyperactive behavior in preschool children.

Snacks made with the fake fat olestra no longer will have to bear the unappetizing label that warned they might cause cramps and diarrhea. The Food and Drug Administration lifted the warning Friday, concluding that if the zero-calorie fat substitute has any stomach-troubling effect, it is mild and rare. The FDA approved olestra's sale in 1996, providing packages bore labels spelling out possible gastrointestinal side effects.

In the first major change to the nutrition labels on packaged foods since they were established in 1993, the government announced Wednesday that it would require food companies to list the amount of unhealthful "trans fatty acids" in their products by 2006. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson said trans fatty acids, like saturated fat, raise levels of so-called bad cholesterol in the blood.