FDA is pulling two old food dyes - but for disuse, not on safety grounds

FDA has revoked its authorisation for the synthetic dye Orange B, effective 8 September 2026, and proposed doing the same for Citrus Red No. 2 — but the stated reason is disuse, not danger [s1][s2]. In both orders the agency concluded the colours had been abandoned decades ago and said explicitly that the general safety of synthetic food colours "is beyond the scope of this action" [s1].

What the two orders say

Orange B was authorised only for colouring the casings or surfaces of frankfurters and sausages [s1]. In a final order published on 23 July 2026, FDA repealed that listing after finding, from its own batch-certification records, that Orange B was last certified in 1978 and that no manufacturer has requested certification since [s1]. The agency concluded the authorised use had been "abandoned" and the regulation was "outdated and unnecessary," and it removed the listing from 21 CFR part 74 [s1]. Once the revocation takes effect, any Orange B remaining in commerce is treated as uncertified, and food containing it is deemed adulterated [s1].

The same day, FDA issued a proposed order to revoke Citrus Red No. 2, a dye permitted only for colouring the skins of mature oranges not intended for processing [s2]. Certification data again show the colour is no longer used and appears to have been abandoned; the agency took comment on the proposal through 24 August 2026 before it can finalise [s2].

Why "abandoned" is the operative word

These are regulatory clean-ups, and the distinction matters for how a reader should weigh them. FDA is required to review its color-additive listings and remove ones that are, in the language it cites, "outmoded, ineffective, insufficient, or excessively burdensome" [s1]. A listing for a dye that has not been certified since the Carter administration fits that description regardless of any safety question. The Orange B order notes that in the late 1970s its sole manufacturer and others evaluated potential health implications, which contributed to the end of its production — but FDA rested the revocation on abandonment, not on a safety finding, and said so [s1].

That framing is what separates these two actions from the higher-profile removal of Red No. 3, which FDA took on safety grounds after evidence of cancer in laboratory animals, not because the dye had fallen out of use. Orange B and Citrus Red No. 2 are being struck from the books because nobody makes or uses them; Red No. 3 was struck because of what it does. Conflating the two would misread both.

FDA also tied the Orange B revocation to a long-standing petition: it described the order as partly responsive to a 2008 citizen petition from the Center for Science in the Public Interest that had asked, among other things, for the approval to be pulled [s1]. That a request to delist a functionally dead additive took more than fifteen years to resolve is itself a comment on the pace of additive housekeeping.

The order is also not quite unconditional. FDA published it as a final order that can still be delayed or stayed if a party files proper objections and a request for a hearing by 24 August 2026, showing a genuine and substantial factual dispute — for instance, evidence that Orange B is in fact still in use [s1]. And the agency situated both actions within a wider deregulatory drive, citing Executive Order 14192, "Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation" (90 FR 9065), an HHS request for information on "Ensuring Lawful Regulation and Unleashing Innovation to Make America Healthy Again" (90 FR 20478), and the periodic-retrospective-review requirement of Executive Order 13563 (76 FR 3821) [s1]. That is FDA's stated reason for acting now; the legal finding underneath it is still abandonment, not safety [s1].

What it does and doesn't mean for the food supply

Because both dyes were already out of use, revoking them changes essentially nothing on the shelf — no reformulation, no products withdrawn, no shift in what shoppers encounter. The practical effect is to shorten the list of legally permitted synthetic colours, not to alter what is actually in food. Readers looking for the live safety debate over colours that are still widely used will find it not here but in the evidence on food dyes and children's behaviour, and in FDA's broader work on how it defines and regulates added ingredients and on front-of-package labelling.

What to watch

Whether FDA finalises the Citrus Red No. 2 revocation as proposed after reviewing comments; whether the agency continues to work through other long-dormant color-additive listings on the same abandonment rationale; and whether these disuse-based clean-ups get publicly conflated with the safety-based removals they are careful to distinguish themselves from.