![]() ![]() The sweets were accidentally made with arsenic. The symptoms of “Franken Berry Stool” were pretty benign compared to other more notable confectionary mishaps in history: The accidental poisoning of more than 200 people in Bradford, England in 1858 comes to mind. 40, which appears in all five of the General Mills monster cereals, and Red No. These days, the only red colors accepted by the FDA are Red No. Inquiries to General Mills as to when the Franken Berry ingredients switched to less poop-worrying dyes, were not responded to. “However, to avoid consumer confusion, the red candies were pulled from the color mix.” The red food coloring in question was not actually used in M&M’s chocolate candies, according to mms.com. 2 the removal of the red candies was a response to the scare, reports: That same year, Mars removed their red M&M’s from the candy-color spectrum for nearly a decade, even though Mars didn’t even use Red No. According to the FDA, 47 other countries, including Canada and the United Kingdom, still allow for the use of Red Dye No. Between public outcry against the dye and the chance that trace elements could potentially have carcinogens, the FDA banned a number of other dyes as well. Years of research led the FDA to find that even though the Russian study was extremely flawed (the FDA couldn’t even prove that amaranth was one of the dyes used), the agency would remove the dye from its Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS) list in 1976. 2, the one used by the original Franken Berry cereal, was one of the most widely used color additives at the time, until a 1971 Russian study reported that the dyes caused tumors in female rats. More than 20 years later, in 1938, Congress passed the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act which gave these colors numbers instead of chemical names-every batch needed to be certified by the Food and Drug Administration, though some problems still arose: in the fall of 1950, many children became ill from eating an orange Halloween candy containing one to two percent FD&C Orange No. Since then, upon further study, several of these choices have been delisted. ![]() In 1906, Congress passed the first legislation for food colors, the Pure Food and Drug Act, deeming seven colors suitable for use in food: orange, erythrosine, ponceu 3R, amaranth (the color later used in Franken Berry cereal), indigotin, naphthol yellow, and light green. At the turn of the 20th century, with virtually no regulation of more than 80 dyes used to color food, the same dyes used for clothes could also be used to color confections and other edibles. Ruth Winters’s A Consumer’s Dictionary of Cosmetic Ingredients details the history of commercial food dyes, including those later used in Franken Berry. Apparently, green stool seems less life-threatening than the reddish hue caused by Franken Berry.īut pink poop wasn’t always the worst side effect from colored confections. 1 ( a dye currently banned in Norway, Finland and France) and turns stool green. Booberry, which debuted in December of 1972, for example, uses Blue No. The author warns that “physicians should be aware of its potential for producing reddish stools.” Other monster cereals at the time also used dyes that caused stool to change colors. But other than pink poop, there were no other symptoms, Payne reports, “Physical examination upon admission revealed in no acute distress and with normal vital signs…Physical examination was otherwise unremarkable.”Īt the time of the study, the product had only been on the market for a few weeks. By the fourth day, they did a little experiment: They fed the boy four bowls of Franken Berry cereal and for the next two days, he passed bright pink stools. Further questioning of the mother revealed that the child had enjoyed a bowl of Franken Berry cereal two days and one day prior to his hospitalization. “The stool had no abnormal odor but looked like strawberry ice cream,” Payne reports. The synthetic dye can’t be broken down or absorbed by the body.Ī 1972 case study, “ Benign Red Pigmentation of Stool Resulting from Food Coloring in a New Breakfast Cereal (The Franken Berry Stool),” published in Pediatrics explains the phenomenon later known as “Franken Berry Stool.” A 12-year-old boy was hospitalized for four days after being admitted for possible rectal bleeding. 3., originally and chemically known as amaranth, a synthetic color named after the natural flower. The latter was colored red using “Food, Drug and Cosmetics” (FD & C) Red No. Within that same year, not-so-coincidentally, General Mills released their classic monster cereals Count Chocula and Franken Berry. ![]() Hundreds of mothers hospitalized their children for fecal testing out of fear of internal bleeding. Led Zepplin was about to blow our minds, a prison riot had been shut down at Attica, and all across America, kids were pooping pink. In 1971, Walt Disney World had just opened in Orlando, Florida. ![]()
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