Twenty percent of 2,164 baby foods sampled between 2003 and 2013 by the Food and Drug Administration tested positive for lead, according to an analysis released Thursday by the nonprofit advocacy group, the Environmental Defense Fund.

Lead is a neurotoxin. Exposure at a young age can permanently affect a developing brain, causing lifelong behavioral problems and lower IQ. Though the levels in the baby food were generally below what the FDA considers unsafe, the agency’s standards are decades old. The latest research suggests that there is no safe level of lead for children. Yet the Environmental Protection Agency this year has estimated that more than five percent of US children (more than a million) get more than the FDA’s recommended limit of lead from their diet.

The products most often found to contain lead were fruit juices, root vegetable-based foods, and certain cookies, such as teething biscuits, the EDF reports. Oddly, the presence of lead was more common in baby foods than in the same foods marketed for adults. For instance, only 25 percent of regular apple juice tested positive for lead, while 55 percent of apple juices marketed for babies contained lead. Overall, only 14 percent of adult foods tested contained lead.

The findings come from data collected in the FDA’s annual survey of foods, called the Total Diet Survey, which the agency has run since the 1970s. Each year, the agency samples 280 types of foods from three different cities across the country, tracking nutrients, metals, pesticides, and other contaminants.

The survey preferentially includes national brands, but, unfortunately, the agency does not identify the brands or their test results—something parents are likely to want to know. In March of this year, the EDF submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to get that brand-level data from the agency. For now, the only brand-level data available is that from a 2012 Consumer Reports review of juices.

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For the new analysis, the EDF sifted through 12,000 publicly available food tests from the 11 years. The 2,000 or so samples that were marketed for babies were split into 57 food types by the FDA. Of the 57 categories, 52 contained at least one food sample that tested positive for lead.

For simplicity, the EDF sorted the baby foods into eight categories: root vegetables; non-root vegetables; fruits including juices; cereal; infant formula; prepared meals; crackers and cookies; and desserts.

Root vegetable-based foods fared the worst, with 65 percent testing positive overall. The top offenders in this category were sweet potatoes and carrots: 86 percent of 44 sweet potato samples were positive, and 43 percent of carrot foods tested positive of 44 samples. The cookie/crackers category came in second with 47 percent positive overall. Arrowroot cookies (64 percent of 44 samples) and teething biscuits (4 percent of 43 samples) were most often found positive.

In third place were fruit juices, with 29 percent positive overall. The juices with the highest positive rates were: grape (89 percent of 44 samples), mixed fruit (67 percent of 111 samples), apple (55 percent of 44 samples), and pear (45 percent of 44 samples).

Lower standards

The levels in the foods were below what the FDA considers alarming, and the dose that a child gets depends on their overall diet and what other exposures they have. The major source of lead exposure in US children is paint, in the forms of paint chips and dust from aging housing. Contaminated water and soil are also sources.

That said, the FDA’s food standards were set in 1993. Those standards suggest that children get no more than six micrograms of lead per day, based on children having no more than 10 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood. However, a 2012 NIH study found evidence that levels less than 5 μg/dL “decreased academic achievement, IQ, and specific cognitive measures; increased incidence of attention-related behaviors and problem behaviors.” The EDF reported that the CDC is expected to lower its recommended blood levels to no more than 3.5 μg/dL in 2017.

For now, the FDA requires bottled water to have no more than five parts-per-billion of lead, mainly because that “was the lowest amount FDA could reliably measure in 1995, and only four percent of the water tested exceeded the limit,” the EDF reports. The Academy of Pediatrics suggests drinking water in schools contain no more than one ppb. The FDA doesn’t have any firm regulations on lead in other foods but limits lead in grape juices to 50 ppb.

What the source of lead might be in the baby food is unclear. The suspected sources include contaminated crop soil and contamination during processing or packaging. It’s also unclear why baby foods would have more lead than adult foods and why some products within a food category could test negative while others had relatively high amounts. The EDF recommends that the FDA and manufacturers step up their game to reduce lead in products, and parents should consult with their pediatricians to figure out strategies to limit exposure.

The FDA has indicated that it is re-evaluating its standards for lead in foods.