Confusion over safe food for people with allergies

ONE in three products on the supermarket shelf that have been assessed for their allergen risk do not have warning labels, leaving customers in the dark.

Food manufacturers may be reluctant to label a food as “safe” because of fears of litigation.

FOOD labelling should be ­expanded to alert people with allergies about safe products as well as those to avoid, Victorian research has suggested.

While “may contain” warnings are found everywhere on our food, the same risk assessment used by manufacturers to determine if a product needs a label also finds many are suitable for people with allergies.

In fact, as many as a third of processed foods, including cer­eal, sauces and snacks, have been deemed safe yet remain unlabelled.

Paediatric gastroenterologist and allergist Professor Katie Allen said this was confusing because processed food that had not been assessed as safe was also unlabelled, leaving people with allergies to ­either take a risk or avoid all of them and limit their diet.

“Unlabelled products have either been through a risk ­assessment or not through anything, so they are both the safest and the most dangerous,” she said.

Allergy consumers are taking significant risks with some labelling, according to Professor Allen.

Introducing “permissive labelling” that indicated safe and suitable foods as well as potentially dangerous products would help consumers make more informed choices.

“Allergy consumers are taking significant risks,” Professor Allen said.

“This situation is just an ­accident waiting to happen.”

Victoria has one the highest rates of food allergies in the world, leaving many cautious about what they eat, particularly when it comes to processed foods.

There are two types of labelling — mandatory labels that must be used when one of nine allergens is added to a product, and precautionary ­allergy labelling to alert consumers that the food may contain allergens.

Australian-first research by Murdoch Childrens Research Institute and Victoria University of more than 130 food manufacturers found 30 per cent of products had been ­assessed to see if they needed a warning, but were not labelled.

“It is unclear whether these products contain trivial amounts of the allergens and are safe to consume or whether they have simply not undergone a risk assessment and ­remain untested and therefore unlabelled,” lead author Dr ­Giovanni Zurzolo said.

Food manufacturers may be reluctant to label a food as “safe” because of fears of litigation, but Professor Allen said simply indicating the food had been through a risk assessment process would suffice.

The study’s findings were published in theClinical & ­Experimental Allergy journal.

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