Amaranth (E123): What the Sources Found

Amaranth is the colour the food industry lists as E123. In our table it is high risk: it takes 30 of the 33 additive points off a product's score for a child.

In short

High risk. 30 of the 33 additive points come off a product that carries it.
No child flag. Nothing below is written about children specifically, so the class is the same at every age.
2 citations from FDA, EFSA, each one below.

What Amaranth does to a score

A packaged food starts with 33 points for what is in its ingredient list. Amaranth takes 30 of the 33 additive points off a product's score. Scan the pack in Sito and the score you get is the one for your own child's age, with this additive named in the reasons. How we score has the whole method.

What the sources found

Every classification in our table comes from the citations below, and nothing else. They are quoted as the source wrote them.

FDA Color Additive Status List - FD&C Red No. 2 (amaranth), terminated for US food use in 1976
Amaranth has been banned as a food colour in the United States since 1976; it is not a certified colour additive for US food.
EFSA 10.2903/j.efsa.2010.1649
ADI lowered to 0.15 mg/kg bw/day (from SCF 0-0.8 and JECFA 0-0.5); the Panel concluded amaranth is neither genotoxic nor carcinogenic.

Why this class

IARC Group 1 or 2A with a dietary exposure route; or EFSA has withdrawn or negated a safety conclusion; or EFSA’s own exposure assessment finds a child age group exceeding the ADI at mean intake; or the substance is banned or formally being phased out for food use by the EU, by the US FDA, or under a US state law.

Our confidence in this row's classification is medium. Medium or low does not mean the evidence is weak; it means something about the row is still being pinned down, usually a regulatory status confirmed from one source rather than two.