Latest news with #contamination
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
‘Entire Stock' of Popular Candy Brand Recalled in 1 Country
'Entire Stock' of Popular Candy Brand Recalled in 1 Country originally appeared on Parade. Haribo is recalling its "entire stock" in one country after multiple bags of candy were discovered to have been contaminated by cannabis. As reported by the BBC, several consumers in the Netherlands began to feel ill after eating sweets from a 1kg package of Haribo Happy Cola F!ZZ. The NVWA, which is the country's food safety body, said that "dizziness" was one symptom reported after consumption of the affected candies, telling Dutch broadcaster SBS6 that "samples were taken and cannabis was found in them." So far, three affected packages have been identified, each with a best-before date of January 2026 and lot code of L341-4002307906. Haribo has recalled "its entire stock as a precaution," per the publication, though it's not clear if that refers to just the Happy Cola F!ZZ line or if it encompasses all of their products in the Netherlands. A representative for the brand told the BBC that it's cooperating with law enforcement investigators to "establish the facts around the contamination" and is taking the incident "very seriously." "Do not eat the sweets," the NVWA emphasized, though plenty of jokers online quipped things like, "You say contaminated. I say blessed," and, "But wait.... do you have any of those contaminated bags still? Asking for a friend."'Entire Stock' of Popular Candy Brand Recalled in 1 Country first appeared on Parade on May 31, 2025 This story was originally reported by Parade on May 31, 2025, where it first appeared.
Forbes
2 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
The Cannabis Industry Tries To Police Itself In California
A laboratory worker tests cannabis for harmful contaminants. (Photo by Robert ATANASOVSKI / AFP) ... More (Photo by ROBERT ATANASOVSKI/AFP via Getty Images) No one likes dirty weed. Or unclean air or polluted water. Most citizens are too busy to keep track of what's clean and what's not, so they depend on the government to do that work for them. They expect their hard-earned tax dollars will be used for basic services like clean water and air. When these basic services are not done properly, scandal erupts as whistleblowers or journalists uncover the truth. Contaminated drinking water in Flint, Michigan, is one example that captured the nation's attention. In my home state of California, a giant scandal erupted in June 2024 when the Los Angeles Times and Weed Week reported that many cannabis brands were contaminated with pesticides and heavy metals despite lab testing being a big part of the regulatory framework for legalization. In fact, a majority of legal brands and illicit products that the Times and Weed Week independently lab tested failed. Further examination of these press reports finds one scary pesticide after another was found in the legal supply chain. Consumer confidence may have taken a big hit as a result. The reports also indicate that the Department of Cannabis Control (DCC), the regulating body of legal weed in the state, failed to do its job by properly regulating the labs that do the testing. As a result, the Times found that many labs falsify reports to give their clients a clean bill of health or higher potency results, or both. This corruption should, in theory, be easy to detect by the DCC within their own lab-testing facility but no such facility currently exists or is operational as of this writing. It's no secret that legal weed is heavily regulated and taxed in California but surprisingly, the commercial lab-testing facilities were largely left alone with no state lab to verify results and hold actors accountable. Given the existential nature of the scandal on consumer confidence, the legal cannabis industry has taken action to step into this regulatory void with a nonprofit organization called the Environmental and Consumer Protection Organization (ECCO) launched in December 2024. The intent is to give consumers more confidence that cannabis products sold in the licensed market are clean. The ECCO certification logo allows consumers to quickly identify clean products in California ... More dispensaries. ECCO has developed its own set of lab-testing standards for cannabis covering 138 harmful contaminants, far more than what the state DCC requires. Brands can sign up and pay a monthly fee to become members and enter into the lab-testing protocols that ECCO has developed. If a brand passes the tests, it can be certified by ECCO with a ECCO certification logo on products allowing consumers to quickly identify compliant products. "We built ECCO because the industry was operating on broken trust,' said Ford Smith, ECCO founding member and CEO of Ultranative. 'When lab results are manipulated, when contaminants are overlooked, it's not just bad business — it's a public health failure.' Smith was mindful not to throw regulators under the bus when I spoke to him. 'We're not here to play gotcha,' he said. 'We're here to give consumers, patients, and responsible operators a way to rebuild confidence with real transparency and science-backed standards.' When I emailed the DCC for comment, they pointed me to their own data and a report prepared by a third-party economic organization indicating growth in the legal market in 2024. The DCC didn't address the LA Times reporting or the industry forming ECCO in response to that reporting. 'The Department of Cannabis Control's data, and ERA's California Cannabis Market Report, shows an increase in the licensed market through the end of 2024, which belies a lack of consumer trust,' said David Hafner, media relations manager for the DCC. 'To this end, the Department is closely monitoring its licensees as evidenced by the 117 actions taken against licensees and 52 recalls issued in 2025. The Department has no opinion regarding ECCO's claims, its business model, or its motivations.' ECCO is currently working with two lab-testing facilities that have the necessary equipment to complete the rigorous testing panel they've developed. The labs were chosen for their track record of resisting 'THC inflation' and for having transparent ownership willing to share data and undergo the ECCO protocols. This includes blind testing and third-party audits conducted by ECCO. Testing labs Infinite and Anresco are currently doing the testing for ECCO but the organization hopes to bring more labs on in the future. ECCO recently released their first blind-testing audit that's at the core of their attempt to hold the industry accountable. ECCO purchases two SKUs from random licensed cannabis dispensaries and sends them off to the labs. This is essentially what the LA Times did when they dropped their investigative reporting last June. ECCO audits both member brands and non-member brands. The nine member brands all passed the first audit and several non-member brands failed. ECCO has not published the brands that failed yet but that may be due to sharing information and data with the DCC, which is the enforcement agency for any violations. ECCO has described the relationship with the DCC as 'cautiously collaborative' while maintaining their complete independence from the DCC. The collective goal is to get dirty products off the shelf in California as quickly as possible. Citizens may be comforted to see the cannabis industry in California doing the hard work of holding itself accountable especially after the LA Times story dropped. It took about a year for the industry to respond by forming ECCO, developing the lab-testing panel, and conducting the first audit. In my experience, getting this far in one year is laudable and ECCO has other initiatives to build trust with consumers. In the near future, ECCO plans to create displays at retailers like Catalyst, one of the largest in the state, to further inform consumers. Elliot Lewis, CEO of Catalyst, has been a big champion of ECCO on social media. There's still a big challenge ahead to scale ECCO. It's a big state with hundreds of brands and operators. ECCO will need more than the current dozen members to become viable. More large operators like Catalyst will need to embrace ECCO to give it more traction in the market and inform consumers that ECCO exists. There are also other certification organizations like Clean Green and Sun and Earth, which mainly deal with farm certifications not manufacturers. Yet certificate fragmentation may be a concern when funding is limited (as it always is) and consumers may already be confused. The future of ECCO will depend on the willingness of the industry to undergo more scrutiny, buy into the lab-testing protocols, be willing to be held accountable publicly, and tell the story to consumers with transparency and trust. Whether or not the industry is both willing and able to scale ECCO may determine its fate with consumers. Media outlets like the LA Times and Weed Week will no doubt investigate the supply chain again. As the old saying goes, the whole world is watching. If ECCO reaches its potential, then future investigations by the media should be more positive. At that point, the industry may be able to take a bow instead of hanging its head.
ABC News
3 days ago
- Health
- ABC News
EPA takes 'milestone' action against PFAS company 3M Australia
The New South Wales environmental watchdog has taken "milestone" action against a global chemicals manufacturer after discovering PFAS chemicals at an old testing site in the Central West. The NSW Environment Protection Authority (NSW EPA) has issued a clean-up notice to 3M Australia after the forever chemicals were found in soil and water across the 100-hectare Brogans Creek Quarry, south-east of Mudgee. The inactive limestone site was historically leased by the subsidiary of the US-based company for testing firefighting foams containing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances between 1980 and 2000. It is the first time the EPA has taken regulatory action against the Wall Street giant that began manufacturing the chemicals in the 1950s. The environmental regulator described the contamination as "significant" but said the quarry's remote setting meant there was "limited potential for human exposure". The World Health Organisation has determined PFOA as carcinogenic to humans, while it classified PFOS as potentially carcinogenic. Both types of PFAS are found in firefighting foams. The foams are widely considered to be the biggest contamination source of PFAS in Australia's environment, with high concentrations found at sites where they were formerly used, such as defence force bases. They were also recently identified as the most likely source of PFAS chemicals in the Blue Mountains' drinking water supply. The Aqueous Film Forming Foams (AFFF) have been slowly phased out of use in Australia since 2003 but were used for more than three decades since the 1970s. The NSW EPA has banned their use except for in "catastrophic" circumstances or for fires on a watercraft. According to the clean-up notice, the current owner of the contaminated Brogans Creek site, Graymont, alerted the EPA to the contamination in January 2022. The company's site investigation found PFAS was present at elevated concentrations in soil, surface water, sediment, concrete structures and groundwater beneath the site. It also found the substances at levels above safe drinking water guidelines about eight kilometres downstream in the upper reaches of the Capertee River, within the Capertee National Park. NSW National Parks and Wildlife has installed signage at the location, warning people not to use the water for drinking or cooking purposes. But it advised the water was safe for swimming. The EPA investigations concluded it had reason to believe the global chemicals maker was responsible for the contamination as it "tested large volume of AFFF on the land" for two decades. 3M Australia has been given 60 days to submit an investigation management plan or risk a maximum non-compliance penalty of $2 million. "Though this is only the first step in what will likely be a complex and lengthy remediation process, 3M Australia has so far been cooperative — voluntarily offering to conduct investigations to better understand the extent and nature of legacy PFAS contamination at the site," Mr Gathercole said. The chemicals are known to be pervasive in the environment and can take hundreds, if not thousands of years to break down. Due to their heat, water and oil resistance qualities, they are found in everyday products such as non-stick pans and microwave popcorn bags. A recent study by the Australian Bureau of Statistics found three types of PFAS could be found in the blood of 85 per cent of the population. In 2024, a US federal court approved a settlement that would result in 3M Company paying more than $US10 billion to assist America's public water suppliers remove the chemicals. The chemicals maker has announced it would stop manufacturing PFAS by the end of 2025. The ABC has contacted 3M for comment.
ABC News
3 days ago
- Health
- ABC News
Ratepayers will likely cover PFAS contamination costs, Blayney mayor says
A New South Wales mayor says forcing councils to clean up PFAS contamination at landfill sites is "completely at odds with the 'polluter pays' principle". Last year the Belubula River, which flows through the Central West region, was found to be tainted by PFAS chemicals. Blayney Shire Council's landfill sits above a tributary to the river and studies by the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) show the site is a source of PFAS contamination in the Belubula. In March the EPA told the council it would have to pay to fix the problem. "We're being charged to remove contamination for what is still a legal product here in Australia," Mayor Bruce Reynolds said. Waste facilities are known to be a significant secondary source of PFAS, which is a family of about 15,000 chemicals with heat-resistant, non-stick and waterproof properties. They can take hundreds of years to break down and are highly mobile in the environment. The cost of onsite treatment at the Blayney tip, which has been operating for 100 years, has been estimated at more than $400,000 and the cost of ongoing investigation and monitoring estimated at more than $110,000. The council has also been forced to stop using a part of the landfill that has an unlined cell. It estimates the cost of bringing the infrastructure up to EPA standards could exceed $1 million. "We may be the pioneers — others may have to follow," Cr Reynolds said. The council has flagged that it may hike garbage rates by 10 per cent and increase its waste levy by 16 per cent in 2026. In a statement the EPA said it was looking at introducing PFAS monitoring at all landfill sites in NSW. "Landfills have been recognised as a secondary source of PFAS in the environment, though modern engineered landfills minimise the risk of a range of contaminants impacting surrounding environments," a spokesperson said. The authority said it had been working closely with Blayney council since December 2023 to better manage leachate migration from the site and was assessing three grant applications. PFAS has been a concern for the Waste Management and Resource Recovery Association of Australia (WMRR), which represents multi-nationals, small businesses and local governments. In its submission to the NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into PFAS Contamination in Waterways and Drinking Water Supplies, the peak body said the industry could be forced to deal with an issue it did not create. The WMRR described the Commonwealth's move to ban the import, export, use and manufacture of three types of PFAS from 1 July 2025 as "too little, too late". "The ban should be on all types of PFAS, otherwise the government will simply be playing catch up as companies switch to other types of PFAS," its submission reads. "The EU moved to ban PFAS years ago, with the United States introducing tougher drinking water standards and moving to eliminate it from food supply." This week the Australian Bureau of Statistics released a national baseline for PFAS levels in blood and found three types of PFAS were detected in more than 85 per cent of the population. The dataset was created to track PFAS levels over time and to support research into its potential impacts on human health. The ABS noted that there was "an association between higher PFAS levels and some abnormally high chronic disease biomarkers", but said the finding did not confirm a direct cause.
South China Morning Post
5 days ago
- Health
- South China Morning Post
Thai river turns orange as dangerous toxins from Myanmar mines flush downstream
Dangerous levels of arsenic in a northern Thai river contaminated by chemicals used in mines across the border in Myanmar risk unleashing an unprecedented ecological disaster on the kingdom's waterways, environmentalists have warned, as images of the orange-yellow waters go viral. Advertisement Bangkok is seeking renewed talks with Myanmar's junta to stop the toxic sediment flowing downstream into the Kok River, which runs from Shan State, in Myanmar through Thailand's border province of Chiang Rai. But the urgency of the health crisis for riverside communities – who have been warned not to wash, drink or eat fish from the contaminated waterway they depend on – is compounded by the fact that the mines are located in territory controlled by the Wa, an ethnic armed group notorious for drug production, unchecked resource extraction and opaque business ties to China. Thai villagers started to notice the discolouration of the water in March. Fishermen on the Chiang Saen river. Photo: Earth Thailand However, satellite imagery suggests the contamination began as early as last September, when large upstream forest areas in Myanmar were cleared for mining – initially thought to be for gold, but now suspected to involve rare earths, based on the volume of chemical effluent released into the river.
