US health regulators remove three toxic solvents from approved color additives — first cleanup in decades

The US health regulator is removing three solvents (methylene chloride, trichloroethylene, and ethylene dichloride) from the list of approved chemicals for making food and drug colorings because manufacturers stopped using them years ago. The change closes a regulatory loophole where banned-in-practice chemicals stayed on the books, making the rules match reality.

For decades, the FDA allowed solvents that companies had already abandoned, creating a gap between what the rules said and what actually happened in factories. Cleaning this up removes a source of regulatory confusion and signals that the agency will eventually audit the entire color additive list for similar ghosts. This matters because food and pharmaceutical manufacturers rely on knowing which chemicals are actually approved versus which are just old rulings nobody enforces.