THE SOFT DRINK POISON

The news for the soft drink industry hasn't been good. With links to childhood obesity and tooth decay, soft drink sales are down for the first time in 20 years. And sales of bottled water, juices and energy drinks are continuing to eat into the soda market.

But a larger problem may loom.

In February, the FDA quietly revealed that some soft drinks were found to contain the human carcinogen benzene in levels up to 10-20 parts per billion (ppb) -- four times the acceptable limit found in drinking water.

Benzene, a chemical linked to leukemia and other forms of cancer, forms in certain beverages under certain conditions, such as exposure to heat and light. It also forms naturally in forest fires, gasoline and cigarette smoke, among other things, and it's widely used industrially to make plastics, rubber, detergents, drugs and pesticides.

The Environmental Protection Agency requires public notification and alternative water supply for drinking water contaminated with levels of 5 ppb. Even "relatively short periods" of exposure at that level can "potentially cause … temporary nervous system disorders, immune system depression [and] anemia," according to the agency. A lifetime of exposure, says the EPA, can cause "chromosome aberrations [and] cancer."

Though the FDA has not set an acceptable level of benzene for beverages, arguing that the public consumes soft drinks and other beverages in far lower amounts than they do drinking water, parents are sure to be alarmed. Most would likely admit that the amount of soda their kids drink dwarfs water consumption.

The story first broke late last year when an industry whistleblower named Larry Alibrandi posted previously undisclosed documents on the Internet. In 1990, a Cadbury-Schweppes study called Project Denver found that certain soft drinks, particularly diet orange-flavored sodas, had the tendency to form benzene when exposed to heat and light. And memos reveal that the FDA knew about the problem all these years, yet never revealed it to the public or took adequate measures to fix it.

Cadbury-Schweppes' chemists eventually determined that the benzene was caused by a chemical reaction between the preservative sodium benzoate and ascorbic acid (Vitamin C). The effect was found to be especially prevalent in diet sodas, and shot up to even higher levels after products were subjected to extremes of heat and light. According to the documents, Cadbury-Schweppes' Diet Crush was found to contain benzene at 25 parts per billion (ppb) -- five times the acceptable EPA limit. After exposure to 16 hours of ultraviolet light at temperatures around 30 C (86 F), that level jumped to a whopping 82 ppb. Diet Slice (made by Pepsi) contained 1 ppb before exposure, and 41.5 ppb after exposure. Diet Minute Maid (made by Coca-Cola) contained less than 0.5 ppb before exposure and 4.5 ppb afterwards, the documents say.

The problem has lead to recalls in the both U.S. and U.K.

Alibrandi speculates that the Big Three soft drink makers (Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Cadbury-Schweppes) didn't publicly recall their products in 1990 because of fears that they might have to replace sodium benzoate -- an important anti-microbial preservative. Without it or its cousin potassium benzoate, he says, manufacturers would be unable to cold-bottle their drinks, instead having to undertake the more costly process of heat pasteurization. "The Big Three are going to safeguard that preservative," says Alibrandi. "If they told authorities the magnitude of it, maybe the risk was to have the preservative pulled. I imagine that would create a technical nightmare for these folks."

They likely had financial concerns as well. In January 1990, Perrier sparkling water in the United States was found to be contaminated with benzene at levels up to 22 ppb. More than 160 million bottles of water were recalled worldwide, at a loss of $263 million to the company. Perrier's reputation took a hit as well, as the company was condemned for its failure to act quickly and for continuing to advertise during the recall.

After the Project Denver tests, the industry moved quickly to minimize the problem. In less than a month, Cadbury-Schweppes changed the formula for Orange Crush, removing ascorbic acid from the drink. Later, chemists discovered that the benzene-causing reaction could be slowed by a "technical fix" -- the addition of other chemicals called "chelating agents," of which the most common is called calcium disodium EDTA. "The soft drink industry promptly took steps to address the causes of benzene formation, and the matter was resolved through improved manufacturing procedures," said American Beverage Association (ABA) spokesperson Kathleen Dezio in a statement, when the whistleblower documents were posted last year.

While the industry contends the problem was corrected in the most popular sodas, no public recall was ever done. Judging from their ingredients, dozens of products now on the shelves could potentially have the same problem, including such popular brands as Sunny Delight, flavored Diet Pepsi and Fanta Orange. (The Environmental Working Group has posted a partial list of possibly risky products.)

Concerned parents, worried that there might be cancer-causing benzene in kids' drinks, recently filed class-action lawsuits against Polar Beverages Inc. and In Zone Brands Inc. for not taking steps to keep benzene from forming in their beverages.

Atlanta-based In Zone makes BellyWashers, juice drinks that come in reusable bottles featuring Spiderman, Hello Kitty, Scooby Doo and dozens of other well-known characters. Worcester, Mass.-based Polar Beverages makes fruit-flavored sodas and seltzers as well as mixers.

The lawsuits allege that independent laboratory tests found benzene in the companies' drinks at levels above the federal drinking-water limit (5 ppb).

Food and Drug Administration sampling from 1995 through 2001 found similar results in unidentified brands.

"The question is, how much does this problem still exist today?" says Alibrandi, who is now head of American Quality Beverages, a small New York producer of health drinks. "We have hundreds of examples from the trade, and many of them could potentially be a problem. What's especially disconcerting is the products engineered for children, where it's a potentially bigger problem for them since their body mass is very small."

Alibrandi says he was shocked when he recently pulled trade samples of hundreds of beverages and found the same combination of sodium or potassium benzoate and ascorbic acid, including some without the "technical fix" of one of the chelating agents. "I was astounded to see the number of products that contained this combination," says Alibrandi. "If this broke 15 years ago, why wasn't this rectified across the industry? The consumers of America deserve better."