Saccharin Study and Labeling Act of 1977


Saccharin Study and Labeling Act of 1977 or Saccharin Study, Labeling and Advertising Act was a United States federal statute enacting requirements for a scientific observation regarding the impurities in, potential toxicity, and problematic carcinogenicity of a non-nutritive sweetener better known as saccharin. The Act of Congress invoked an immediate eighteen month moratorium prohibiting the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare from pursuing regulatory implications by limiting the production and use of saccharin. The Act codified a warning label requirement advocating the non-nutritive sweetener had been discovered to yield carcinogenicity in laboratory animals.
The S. 1750 legislation was passed by the 95th Congressional session and signed into law by the 39th President of the United States Jimmy Carter on November 23, 1977.

Research Perspective

In 1948 to 1949, U.S. Food and Drug Administration pathologists conducted laboratory analyses on Osborne-Mendel rat specimens concluding lymphosarcoma after a two-year laboratory analysis. In 1951, scientists collaboratively suggested the white crystalline sweetening agent could be a possible carcinogen. In 1958, saccharin was registered Generally Recognized As Safe by decree of the food additives amendment retaining the non-nutritive sweetener as a marketable product for human consumption.
In 1972 to 1973 after much growing concern among the United States population, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation led carcinogenic studies concluding the incidence of bladder tumors in Charles River Sprague-Dawley rat specimens. As a result of the laboratory analyses, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration revoked the Generally Recognized As Safe classification and imposed regulatory procedures restricting the use of saccharin in food products. In 1974, the National Academy of Sciences published a scientific review emphasizing saccharin could not be identified as the carcinogenic agent of benign tumors and malignant tumors due to equivocal analysis procedures, inadequate scientific experimental design, and potential impurities.
In 1977, the Canadian Health Protection Branch Study was completed on Charles River Sprague-Dawley rat specimens concluding lymphoma in the blood cells. The Canadian carcinogenic study encouraged Canada to remove saccharin as a marketable product for human consumption in 1977.

Provisions of the Act

The Act established criteria for the scientific study of saccharin with key elements regarding the display, notification, and labeling of the non-nutritive sweetener.

Saccharin and sweetening agent variants

Saccharin and conduct of study

Entity to conduct study

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Reports to congressional committees

Labeling requirement

Labeling requirement for retail establishments, notice, and display

Vending machines and health risk statement requirements

Information availability and distribution

Amendments to 1977 Act

U.S. Congressional amendments to the Saccharin Study and Labeling Act of 1977.

Repeal of Saccharin Clause

The saccharin health risks clause, 21 U.S.C. § 343a, was repealed by the United States 106th Congressional session enactment of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2001. The 2001 Appropriations Act was confirmed as a federal law by the 42nd President of the United States Bill Clinton on December 21, 2000.