Sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate (E481): What the Sources Found

Sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate is the emulsifier the food industry lists as E481. 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.
Flagged for young children. Set only where EFSA’s own exposure assessment shows toddlers or children exceeding or approaching the ADI, or where a regulator used explicitly child-specific language. For a child under 6 it moves one class up.
3 citations from EFSA, each one below.

What Sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate does to a score

A packaged food starts with 33 points for what is in its ingredient list. Sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate takes 30 of the 33 additive points off a product's score, and a child under 6 sees it one class higher again. 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.

EFSA 10.2903/j.efsa.2013.3144
Re-evaluation of sodium stearoyl-2-lactylate (E 481) and calcium stearoyl-2-lactylate (E 482): ADI of 22 mg/kg bw per day established for E 481/E 482 singly or in combination, from a 1-year rat NOAEL of 2,200 mg/kg bw per day with an uncertainty factor of 100.
EFSA 10.2903/j.efsa.2013.3144 (exposure conclusion)
Verbatim: exposure 'is below the ADI of 22 mg/kg bw/day for all the adult population including the elderly, but exceeds the ADI for other groups of the population at mean level and for all groups of the population at high level' - i.e. children exceed at the mean, with combined SSL+CSL exposure of 28-81 mg/kg bw/day for children at the mean. Main sources: flavoured fermented milk products, bread and rolls, fine bakery wares.
EFSA 10.2903/j.efsa.2013.3125
Companion EFSA statement on the exposure assessment of SSL/CSL (including the extension of authorisation), reporting high-level toddler and child intake estimates well above the 22 mg/kg bw per day ADI.

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IARC Group 1 or 2A with a dietary exposure route; or EFSA has withdrawn or negated a safety conclusion; or EFSA’s own exposure assessment finds a child age group exceeding the ADI at mean intake; or the substance is banned or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 high. 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.