Cadmium: Allowed in Candy but not Pesticides
The EPA standard for maximum concentration of cadmium in drinking water is 5 ppb (μg/L). The EPA does not allow cadmium in pesticides. The maximum allowed limit of cadmium in food coloring is set by the FDA to 15 ppm (mg/L).
- Clinical Toxicology Laboratory
by Leslie M. Shaw, Ph.D.
The EPA would suggest that you avoid drinking a liter of water with as little as 1/200,000,000th of a gram of cadmium in it.
Please note that the 1:999 mixture is an uneducated guess (not likely to accurately reflect colorant:beverage mixture) though the visualization below may lend an idea to just how minuscule the amount of heavy metal contaminant it takes to trigger the EPA’s (versus the FDA’s) precautionary avoidance:
If a cadmium-containing food colorant with the FDA’s recommended maximum cadmium concentration (15/1,000,000 = 1/66,667th of a gram per liter) were mixed into a carbonated beverage at a ratio of 1:999 colorant to beverage, you would have a beverage with 1/66,667,000th of a gram cadmium per liter. That translates to about three times the concentration necessary to qualify your soda pop as tainted by industrial waste runoff.
Fortunately, people are vigilant enough to avoid consuming large quantities of food-coloring enhanced, cadmium-enriched junk food… and it’s a good thing, too. Short term effects of cadmium poisoning may include death and it’s likely that regular ingestion wouldn’t be doing the population any favors over the long term.
… at the very least the insects don’t have to worry about it.