Lead in Childrens Vitamins!
Sent: Thursday, June 10, 2004 12:49 PM
Subject: Lead in Children's vitamins, alert. Lead in Children's vitamins, alert.
Healthy dose? Lab slams children's vitamin over lead contentSaturday, May 22, 2004
By Virginia Linn, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Tara Conroy of Oakmont is a careful shopper, always on the lookout for the most healthful and natural products for her four young children.
A year ago, she found a vitamin brand that sounded perfect: no gluten, no dairy, no chemicals, no artificial ingredients.And the best part was that the vitamins -- L'il Critters Gummy Vites by Northwest Natural Products Inc. of Vancouver, Wash. -- resembled candy Gummi Bears."They love them," she said.
But she was shaken when she learned the product, widely distributed in stores throughout the Pittsburgh area, had been flagged by an independent testing lab for lead contamination."I was so upset," Conroy said. "What is lead doing in these vitamins? These are for children."
Consumerlab.com says its testing found that each vitamin contained 1.25 micrograms of lead. And because the dosage called for two a day, the children may have been getting up to 2.5 micrograms of lead a day.A second lab, repeating the tests on blinded samples, confirmed the results, said Dr. Tod Cooperman, who founded ConsumerLab, based in White Plains, N.Y.
The analysis is part of a larger review of multivitamins, which are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, that ConsumerLab released yesterday. Gummy Vites was the only children's vitamin not approved by ConsumerLab of the four brands tested.
"In our view, any kid vitamin should have no more than half a microgram [of lead] per daily serving," Cooperman said. The lab also found that it was missing half the folic acid claimed on the label.
Northwest Natural Products officials disputes the ConsumerLab report and contends the Gummy Vites are well below all state and federal standards for lead limits.
Results of Northwest's own testing at an independent lab, Covance Laboratories Inc. of Vancouver, showed the vitamins contained less than 50 ppb of lead, which the lab said was equivalent to less than 0.25 micrograms of lead per two Gummy Vites.But even if levels were as high as detected by ConsumerLab, they would still be within federal limits, said Northwest President Kate Jones. FDA guidelines say that 6 micrograms per deciliter per day is acceptable for children under 6, and up to 75 mcg/dl is acceptable for older children and adults.
Jones emphasized that the vitamins are safe and have been certified by other quality control agencies.People are exposed to lead in the air, in dirt, around the home and in foods such as potatoes, legumes, dairy products, chocolate, meats and fish, said Bruce Good, chief of the Allegheny County Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program. Lead exposure is cumulative, so he suggested that if consumers have a choice of other vitamins that do not contain lead, they should use those.
A study published last year in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that exposure to levels of lead that had been regarded as safe actually caused dramatic drops in IQ scores of young children (read the abstract for the article). Dr. Herbert Needleman, of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, whose pioneering research made the first definitive link between lead and IQ, noted at the time that the findings suggested that there is no acceptable level of exposure to lead.After learning of the contamination through a magazine article last week, Conroy took her children to the pediatrician's office for blood tests to measure lead. The results showed lead exposure to be less than 3 micrograms per deciliter.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers lead levels "elevated" at 10 or more micrograms per deciliter.The New England Journal study showed that children with a lead level of 10 mcg/dl had IQ scores that were 7 points lower than those whose levels averaged 1 mcg/dl.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04143/320354.stm
Buyer Beware!!
More reason to trust Shaklee. As many as 176 separate tests for purity, freshness, potency, and safety are performed on the raw ingredients for a single product--including tests for pesticides, arsenic, lead and organic solvent residues. Shaklee has never had a product recalled in their 50 year history!
Check out the children's chewable product:
http://www.shaklee.net/thewellnesshut/product/20021
http://www.thewellnesshut.com/
Subject: Lead in Children's vitamins, alert. Lead in Children's vitamins, alert.
Healthy dose? Lab slams children's vitamin over lead contentSaturday, May 22, 2004
By Virginia Linn, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Tara Conroy of Oakmont is a careful shopper, always on the lookout for the most healthful and natural products for her four young children.
A year ago, she found a vitamin brand that sounded perfect: no gluten, no dairy, no chemicals, no artificial ingredients.And the best part was that the vitamins -- L'il Critters Gummy Vites by Northwest Natural Products Inc. of Vancouver, Wash. -- resembled candy Gummi Bears."They love them," she said.
But she was shaken when she learned the product, widely distributed in stores throughout the Pittsburgh area, had been flagged by an independent testing lab for lead contamination."I was so upset," Conroy said. "What is lead doing in these vitamins? These are for children."
Consumerlab.com says its testing found that each vitamin contained 1.25 micrograms of lead. And because the dosage called for two a day, the children may have been getting up to 2.5 micrograms of lead a day.A second lab, repeating the tests on blinded samples, confirmed the results, said Dr. Tod Cooperman, who founded ConsumerLab, based in White Plains, N.Y.
The analysis is part of a larger review of multivitamins, which are not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, that ConsumerLab released yesterday. Gummy Vites was the only children's vitamin not approved by ConsumerLab of the four brands tested.
"In our view, any kid vitamin should have no more than half a microgram [of lead] per daily serving," Cooperman said. The lab also found that it was missing half the folic acid claimed on the label.
Northwest Natural Products officials disputes the ConsumerLab report and contends the Gummy Vites are well below all state and federal standards for lead limits.
Results of Northwest's own testing at an independent lab, Covance Laboratories Inc. of Vancouver, showed the vitamins contained less than 50 ppb of lead, which the lab said was equivalent to less than 0.25 micrograms of lead per two Gummy Vites.But even if levels were as high as detected by ConsumerLab, they would still be within federal limits, said Northwest President Kate Jones. FDA guidelines say that 6 micrograms per deciliter per day is acceptable for children under 6, and up to 75 mcg/dl is acceptable for older children and adults.
Jones emphasized that the vitamins are safe and have been certified by other quality control agencies.People are exposed to lead in the air, in dirt, around the home and in foods such as potatoes, legumes, dairy products, chocolate, meats and fish, said Bruce Good, chief of the Allegheny County Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program. Lead exposure is cumulative, so he suggested that if consumers have a choice of other vitamins that do not contain lead, they should use those.
A study published last year in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that exposure to levels of lead that had been regarded as safe actually caused dramatic drops in IQ scores of young children (read the abstract for the article). Dr. Herbert Needleman, of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, whose pioneering research made the first definitive link between lead and IQ, noted at the time that the findings suggested that there is no acceptable level of exposure to lead.After learning of the contamination through a magazine article last week, Conroy took her children to the pediatrician's office for blood tests to measure lead. The results showed lead exposure to be less than 3 micrograms per deciliter.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers lead levels "elevated" at 10 or more micrograms per deciliter.The New England Journal study showed that children with a lead level of 10 mcg/dl had IQ scores that were 7 points lower than those whose levels averaged 1 mcg/dl.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/04143/320354.stm
Buyer Beware!!
More reason to trust Shaklee. As many as 176 separate tests for purity, freshness, potency, and safety are performed on the raw ingredients for a single product--including tests for pesticides, arsenic, lead and organic solvent residues. Shaklee has never had a product recalled in their 50 year history!
Check out the children's chewable product:
http://www.shaklee.net/thewellnesshut/product/20021
http://www.thewellnesshut.com/
posted by Connie Varner at 5:46 PM
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