Artificial Flavours

Artificial flavours are made from synthetic ingredients. They mimic the natural flavours found in foods. Companies prefer to use artificial flavours because they are much cheaper than flavours from the natural source.

Artificial flavours have been found to have undesirable effects on health including headaches and allergies. Because there are many steps and substances involved in the production of artificial flavours it can be hard to find out what chemicals were used in each flavours production as they will not be listed on the label. In 2018 the FDA banned seven artificial additives found in artificial flavourings used in flavours, six of which were shown to cause cancer in lab animals.