The Food and Drug Administration issued a safety warning Wednesday, saying it identified additional cinnamon products in the United States that are contaminated with lead.
The ground cinnamon products found to contain lead are: La Fiesta, from La Superior SuperMercados; Marcum, from Save A Lot; MK, from SF Supermarket; Swad, from Patel Brothers; Supreme Tradition, from Dollar Tree & Family Dollar; and Eli Chilar, from La Joya Morelense.
In a statement, a spokesperson for Dollar Tree said the retailer has removed all Supreme Tradition ground cinnamon products from its stores nationwide.
“We take this situation very seriously,” the spokesperson said. NBC News has reached out to the other retailers for comment.
People should not eat, sell or serve the ground cinnamon products and should throw them out, the FDA said. The products have a long shelf life, the agency noted.
No illnesses or adverse events have been reported.
An analysis by the FDA found the six products had elevated lead levels ranging from 2.03 to 3.4 parts per million. The FDA has only set limits for lead levels in certain foods; spices aren’t among them. The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, however, has a proposed international safety standard of 2.5 parts per million for spices that include cinnamon.
Lead exposure can be harmful to both children and adults, but high levels of lead can be especially dangerous for children, potentially leading to serious health issues such as learning and behavior problems and a lower IQ, the FDA said. Other problems can include damage to the brain and nervous system and issues with hearing and speech, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The warning comes after the recall of lead-contaminated cinnamon applesauce pouches, from the Florida-based company WanaBana USA. As of Feb. 23, the CDC said it had received 468 reports of confirmed, suspected and probable cases of lead poisoning linked to the pouches from 44 states. Many of the people sickened were young children.
The agency has said cinnamon was the likely source of the lead contamination in the applesauce pouches. Following that recall, the FDA set out to sample ground cinnamon products from discount stores for lead contamination.
It’s unclear if the contaminated products identified by the FDA Wednesday were sourced by the same supplier as WanaBana. The FDA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Laurie Beyranevand, director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law and Graduate School, said it would not be unusual for the cinnamon to be sourced from the same supplier.
“Given the complexities of the food supply chain, the contaminated cinnamon likely wound up in many different products,” she said.
Brian Ronholm, director of food policy for Consumer Reports, a nonprofit group that does research on the safety of the food system, called the FDA’s warning “alarming.”
“It demonstrates that the problem is more pervasive than we might believe,” he said.
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