For generations, Black communities have lived with the health consequences of decisions we did not make — from toxic industrial sites placed near our neighborhoods to contaminated water systems, polluted air, and unsafe consumer products.
These exposures don’t just harm us in the moment. They accumulate across lifetimes and generations, shaping everything from chronic disease rates to pregnancy outcomes.
A new analysis from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) underscores just how deeply this problem reaches: the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) currently allows 25 chemicals linked to cancer to be used in the U.S. food system.
These chemicals can get into foods throughout the supply chain — in ingredients, processing aids, packaging, and manufacturing materials. EDF identified 8 chemicals known to cause cancer in humans and 17 chemicals classified as probable carcinogens that FDA still permits, even though every one of them is recognized for having cancer-causing potential by the National Institutes of Health and the World Health Organization.
For Black families, this is not just a regulatory failure. It is a direct threat to our health, our children, and our future.
A hidden driver of Black maternal health disparities
Black women in the United States face a maternal mortality rate nearly three times higher than white women. Environmental exposures — including toxic chemicals in food, water, and household products are a major but often overlooked threat. Research shows that reducing exposure to harmful chemicals can lower the risk of preterm birth, low birth weight, fibroids, infertility and pregnancy complications that disproportionately affect Black mothers.
Cleaning up the chemicals around us is not just about preventing cancer. It is about protecting Black motherhood, supporting healthy pregnancies, and ensuring that Black babies enter the world with the strongest possible start.
The chemicals FDA still allows — and why that matters
Some of the carcinogens still permitted by the FDA include:
- Formaldehyde, used in food contact surfaces and defoaming agents, which can contaminate food and increase cancer risk.
- Methylene chloride, used in decaffeination and spice extraction, linked to cancer, liver damage, neurological harm, and even death at high exposures.
- Trichloroethylene (TCE), associated with cancer and fetal heart defects.
- Asbestos, still allowed in certain food‑related manufacturing materials despite its deadly legacy.
These chemicals don’t just threaten consumers. They endanger farmworkers, food processing workers, and warehouse workers — jobs disproportionately held by Black and Brown people.
Black communities face higher exposure
Environmental injustice is not acceptable or an accident. Black Americans are 75% more likely to live near facilities that produce hazardous waste. We are more likely to have contaminated drinking water systems. We are more likely to live in neighborhoods with higher levels of air pollution, which increases cancer risk and worsens pregnancy outcomes. Black children experience higher exposure to endocrine‑disrupting chemicals found in plastics, packaging, and household products.
These exposures don’t happen in isolation. Everyone is exposed repeatedly to many chemicals through the food, water, air and products they use every day. For example, a child who drinks water with elevated lead levels, breathes air near an industrial facility, and eats food with harmful additives is likely to face cumulative harms from all of these exposures that no one agency fully keeps track of or regulates. When the FDA fails to remove carcinogens from our food, it leaves open another exposure pathway that can add to cumulative risk for illness or disease.
The law is clear — but where is FDA?
The 1958 Food Additives Amendment explicitly prohibits adding carcinogens to food. The Delaney Clause leaves no room for interpretation: cancer‑causing chemicals do not belong in our food, period.
Yet FDA has continued to allow them for decades. The agency has kept approvals in place for chemicals long known to cause cancer, even when safer alternatives exist.
EDF and other organizations have petitioned the FDA to remove several of these substances, including methylene chloride. More than a year later, the agency has not responded. When the FDA finally banned Red No. 3 in 2025 — a carcinogenic dye used for decades — about 35 years after the FDA had already prohibited its use in cosmetics
Environmental justice requires chemical justice
Removing carcinogens from our food system is one of the most direct ways to reduce health disparities, especially for Black mothers and babies. It is also one of the clearest opportunities for the federal government to uphold its responsibility to protect public health.
The FDA already has the authority to revoke approvals for carcinogens. It does not need to wait for petitions, lawsuits, or public pressure. It simply needs to enforce the law as written. Black communities deserve food that nourishes us, not chemicals that harm us.
And here’s the truth we must hold onto:
Individual choices are powerful, but the biggest wins come when safety is built in. Consumers shouldn’t need a Ph.D. in chemistry to find safe products, water, or food. Communities across the nation rely on policies from our government’s Food and Drug Administration and Environmental Protection Agency to ensure our food, water, and household products are safe. When we can meaningfully address chemical and environmental injustice with better standards, we can move the needle towards healthier homes and better protect the health and environment for generations to come.