Other food products that list titanium dioxide are Lucerne cottage cheese, Beyond Meat's chicken plant-based tenders, Great Value ice cream and Chips Ahoy! cookies.
Titanium dioxide (TiO2) is used in a variety of personal care products, including sunscreens, pressed powders, and loose powders, as a UV filter or whitening agent. In lotions and creams (dermal exposure), it is not a risk for adverse health effects. However, when titanium dioxide is inhalable—as it may be when in powder form—it is considered a possible carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.Titanium dioxide nanoparticles do not appear to confer any unique health hazards.
The chemical is also found in common household and industrial products such as paints, coatings, adhesives, paper, plastics and rubber, printing inks, coated fabrics and textiles, as well as ceramics.
A few non-dietary studies have reported adverse effects in the gastrointestinal tract of laboratory animals given food-grade TiO2. However, these same effects were not seen when the same or higher doses of food-grade TiO2 were administered in the animals' diet. Dietary studies best reflect how humans are exposed to TiO2 from food. Thus, the Food Directorate placed the most emphasis on the results of these studies in the state of the science report.
Furthermore, this packaging has been shown to have both antibacterial and photocatalytic activity, the latter of which reduces ultraviolet (UV) exposure (5Trusted Source, 6).