Fun, colorful packaging aimed at kids and ease of use for parents make it hard to accept that Lunchables actually contain harmful heavy metals and chemicals that can have negative health effects.
Research conducted Consumer Reports Several versions of the brand’s Lunchables and their generic equivalents were found this week to contain lead and cadmium, which have been linked to health problems in both children and adults. Of the 12 store-bought Lunchables and Lunchable-style foods that the nonprofit tested, each contained one or both heavy metals. While none of the products were against the law for containing heavy metals, experts say even low doses of lead and cadmium can affect a child’s development and are associated with an increased risk of hypertension, kidney damage and other health problems. problems in adults.
Although there is no national standard limiting the amount of heavy metals that can be found in most productsConsumer Reports measured lead levels as a percentage of California’s maximum allowable dose level (MADL), the strictest in the country.
Lunch maker Kraft Heinz told Consumer Reports that its products “meet stringent safety standards” and added that “lead and cadmium occur naturally in the environment and may be present in small amounts in foods.” The company did not immediately respond to Luckrequests for comments.
Although lead and cadmium occur naturally in the environment, the researchers who conducted the Consumer Reports study said the levels of lead found in the foods they tested were relatively high for small portion sizes.
The highest lead levels were found in Turkey Lunchables and Cheddar Cracker Stackers, which contained 74% of California’s maximum lead limit. This product was followed by Lunchables pepperoni pizza, which contained 73% of the lead level. In total, five of the 12 products tested by Consumer Reports contained more than 50% of the maximum allowable dose of lead. In addition to Kraft Heinz, the remaining products containing more than 50% of the maximum permissible dose of lead were produced by Smithfield’s Armor LunchMakers and Target’s Good & Gather brand.
Smithfield Foods said this in a statement. Luck that it follows “rigorous programs and policies that promote food safety and quality at every stage of our value chain.” A Target spokesperson said this. Luck in a statement: “We require that our products comply with all applicable federal, state and local regulations.”
Although The Kraft Heinz Company does not specifically highlight sales of Lunchables, “Real Food Snacking,” a business category it shares with products such as nuts, seeds and trail mixes, generated net sales of $1.2 billion for the company in 2023 . That’s about 4.7% of the company’s total net sales of just over $26.6 billion in its most recent fiscal year.
Although Lunchables is aimed at children with funny and entertaining advertisingresearchers who conducted the Consumer Reports study said they’re not necessarily the fun food they’re made out to be.
“We don’t think anyone should eat these foods regularly, and they certainly wouldn’t be considered a healthy school lunch,” Eric Boring, a chemist who led the study, told Consumer Reports.
In addition to lead and cadmium, the study also found phthalates, a group of chemicals used to make plastics more durable, in all but one of the products tested. Phthalates are coming hand in hand with modern processed foods partly through packaging and do not necessarily apply to Lunchables.
But although they may be widely spread In the American food system, phthalates found in the foods studied have been linked to increased health risks, including reproductive problems, obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and some types of cancer, according to Consumer Reports.
“None of the products exceeded any regulatory limits, but many researchers believe these limits are too liberal given new research on the dangers of phthalates,” Boring said.