Day 038 - 19 Oct 94 - Page 46
1
2 Q. Therefore, it would be about 187 and a half?
3 A. Milligrams a day for an adult, yes.
4
5 Q. How far does 187 and half milligrams go as colouring?
6 A. I think it goes quite a long way.
7
8 Q. I mean would it colour 100 third-litre cans of soft drinks
9 or a 1,000 or what? You see, I have nothing to feel my
10 way, nothing to measure this by?
11 A. Forgive me, but I have not prepared -----
12
13 Q. Can you give me any idea?
14 A. I could probably come back with an answer if I went
15 away and looked things up and did some calculations.
16
17 Q. You see, it might make some difference if ---
18 A. I am not prepared to have -----
19
20 Q. -- I can take that in, if I just drink five cans of a soft
21 drink; on the other hand, if I have to drink 1,000 cans of
22 a soft drink in a day, that is another matter, is it not?
23 A. I am not going to pretend to have knowledge that I do
24 not have, but what I would try to persuade you of is this:
25 The dose in these laboratory experiments is substantially
26 higher than one would realistically consume on a similar
27 weight basis in an adult. But the reason why these
28 relatively high doses are used (as I tried to indicate this
29 morning) is because we are using relatively small numbers
30 of animals with relatively short life-span to model the
31 effects on very large populations over a much longer
32 life-span. The dose is scaled up in order to try
33 compensate for that. Given that adverse effects arise at
34 the dose levels they have chosen to use, I think it is
35 unrealistic simply to disregard that and say: "We never
36 consume it at that level, therefore, it is safe".
37
38 It seems to me the appropriate response is, rather, to
39 say: "If those doses are unrealistically high but there is
40 apparent evidence of an adverse effect at that level, the
41 only sensible way to proceed would be to do further tests
42 at lower doses but in large groups of animal". Partly what
43 I am trying to indicate here is that they have never asked
44 for that and that has never been done. That is the only
45 indication that is available and, therefore, I can make my
46 evaluation only by reference to what information is
47 available.
48
49 I am not suggesting that five per cent of the diet, or
50 three per cent, is an adequate model for human
51 consumption. I think that is grounds for having a rather
52 different approach to testing.
53
54 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I appreciate you have a different approach,
55 but in any of those compounds we are considering, have you
56 actually worked out what sort of quantities of a specific
57 food with that additive in it one would have to consume to
58 get anywhere near the ADI?
59 A. I have not done that and I have not been asked to do
60 that. That is something I might be able to do, but
