"Two environmental health groups have resigned from a council meant to lower the heavy metal content of baby foods due to what they say is a lack of cooperation from some of the nation’s biggest baby food brands.
The Baby Food Council was formed in 2019 by Gerber, Earth’s Best, Happy Family Organics and Beech-Nut, as well as the Environmental Defense Fund and Healthy Babies Bright Futures, after years of work and reports from those two environmental health groups drew attention to the high levels of lead, arsenic, mercury and cadmium in baby food. Those heavy metals are neurotoxins that can affect brain development in babies and toddlers.
The council was founded to set voluntary standards to lower concentrations in baby foods and conduct research on farming and production best-practices for reducing heavy metals in ingredients, like sweet potatoes, which often naturally absorb the metals from soil.
“The mission of the Baby Food Council was a shared recognition that there was a problem that needed to be solved,” said Healthy Babies Bright Future’s National Director Charlotte Brody."
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