Is the preservative used to prevent mold growth in foods such as cheese, yogurt, wine, dried meat, pickles, apple cider, and many herbal dietary supplements harmful for humans?
Is Potassium Sorbate Bad for You?
4/5 - (80 votes)
Previously, we’ve looked at the safety of the preservative sodium benzoate. But what about potassium sorbate, commonly used to prevent mold growth in cheese, yogurt, wine, dried meat, pickles, apple cider, and many herbal dietary supplements? Harmful, harmless, or helpful?
Well, it’s been found harmless to Syrian hamsters, but toxic to Chinese hamsters. Then, they discovered it’s actually harmless to Chinese hamster ovary cells, just toxic to Chinese hamster lung cells—but harmless to mouse lung cells. Now rats are a whole ‘nother story.
But what about human cells? Took us until now to find out: “Does potassium sorbate induce genotoxic or mutagenic effects in lymphocytes [human lymphocytes, white blood cells]?” The paper concludes: “Based on our…results, consumers should be made aware that [potassium sorbate] should be considered a genotoxic and mutagenic compound.”
To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by Peter Mellor.
Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.
- Mamur S, Yüzbasioglu D, Unal F, Yilmaz S. Does potassium sorbate induce genotoxic or mutagenic effects in lymphocytes? Toxicol In Vitro. 2010 Apr;24(3):790-4.
- Hasegawa MM, Nishi Y, Ohkawa Y, Inui N. Effects of sorbic acid and its salts on chromosome aberrations, sister chromatid exchanges and gene mutations in cultured Chinese hamster cells. Food Chem Toxicol. 1984 Jul;22(7):501-7.
- Sasaki YF, Kawaguchi S, Kamaya A, Ohshita M, Kabasawa K, Iwama K, Taniguchi K, Tsuda S. The comet assay with 8 mouse organs: results with 39 currently used food additives. Mutat Res. 2002 Aug 26;519(1-2):103-19.
- Schiffmann D, Schlatter J. Genotoxicity and cell transformation studies with sorbates in Syrian hamster embryo fibroblasts. Food Chem Toxicol. 1992 Aug;30(8):669-72.
Image thanks to www.justfinewine.ca, Quinn Dombrowski / Flickr, and www.innocentenglish.com.
Previously, we’ve looked at the safety of the preservative sodium benzoate. But what about potassium sorbate, commonly used to prevent mold growth in cheese, yogurt, wine, dried meat, pickles, apple cider, and many herbal dietary supplements? Harmful, harmless, or helpful?
Well, it’s been found harmless to Syrian hamsters, but toxic to Chinese hamsters. Then, they discovered it’s actually harmless to Chinese hamster ovary cells, just toxic to Chinese hamster lung cells—but harmless to mouse lung cells. Now rats are a whole ‘nother story.
But what about human cells? Took us until now to find out: “Does potassium sorbate induce genotoxic or mutagenic effects in lymphocytes [human lymphocytes, white blood cells]?” The paper concludes: “Based on our…results, consumers should be made aware that [potassium sorbate] should be considered a genotoxic and mutagenic compound.”
To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring, watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by Peter Mellor.
Please consider volunteering to help out on the site.
- Mamur S, Yüzbasioglu D, Unal F, Yilmaz S. Does potassium sorbate induce genotoxic or mutagenic effects in lymphocytes? Toxicol In Vitro. 2010 Apr;24(3):790-4.
- Hasegawa MM, Nishi Y, Ohkawa Y, Inui N. Effects of sorbic acid and its salts on chromosome aberrations, sister chromatid exchanges and gene mutations in cultured Chinese hamster cells. Food Chem Toxicol. 1984 Jul;22(7):501-7.
- Sasaki YF, Kawaguchi S, Kamaya A, Ohshita M, Kabasawa K, Iwama K, Taniguchi K, Tsuda S. The comet assay with 8 mouse organs: results with 39 currently used food additives. Mutat Res. 2002 Aug 26;519(1-2):103-19.
- Schiffmann D, Schlatter J. Genotoxicity and cell transformation studies with sorbates in Syrian hamster embryo fibroblasts. Food Chem Toxicol. 1992 Aug;30(8):669-72.
Image thanks to www.justfinewine.ca, Quinn Dombrowski / Flickr, and www.innocentenglish.com.
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Is Potassium Sorbate Bad for You?
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Content URLDoctor's Note
Be sure to check out all my other videos on preservatives.
For more context, check out my associated blog post: Should We Avoid Titanium Dioxide?
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