West Virginia Gov. Patrick Morrisey in March signed into law a ban on seven artificial dyes from foods served in schools across the state.
The ban on the dyes in school meals took effect Aug. 1 before the law expands to ban those same dyes from all food products sold in the state by 2028.
It is the first state law of its kind that has already taken effect, but is part of a much larger movement nationwide.
Other states, including California, Delaware, Louisiana, and Texas, have passed laws that ban certain dyes from foods served in schools, but those laws have longer runways for implementation. As of March, lawmakers in 20 states had introduced nearly 40 bills aimed at regulating or banning food dyes and other additives, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Recently, food manufacturers and industry groups have announced steps to remove many artificial dyes from their products.
And the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in April announced a phase-out of petroleum-based synthetic dyes over the next few years and the authorization of natural alternatives.
The changes have been accelerated by Health and Human Services Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s “Make America Healthy Again” push.
One school nutrition director in West Virginia and an official with the national School Nutrition Association shared some steps districts can take now to prepare, even if their state hasn’t yet passed a ban on artificial dyes in school meals.
Review school menus before a food dye ban takes effect, if possible
West Virginia’s law, passed in March, had a deadline of Aug. 1 for schools to comply with the ban on seven types of dyes. By that time, many of the menus for the next school year in the Barbour County district had already been set, said Chris Derico, the district’s nutrition director, and it felt like a tall task to review all the items and products the district was planning to use to determine whether they had prohibited dyes—which have been linked to elevated cancer risk and hyperactivity and neurobehavioral problems in children.
Once the “shock factor” wore off, though, it didn’t turn out to be a major problem, Derico said. Still, having more time to prepare, review, and find alternatives would have been helpful, he said.
He advised districts across the country—regardless of whether a similar ban on food dyes has been proposed in their state yet—to familiarize themselves with the products they have on their menus, and take note of items that could become targets. Then, districts can create lists of possible alternatives in advance, and work with the manufacturers to explore what alternatives they might already have in stock, Derico said.
Reviewing menus for potentially problematic dyes could happen at the same time that districts review their menus to ensure they comply with new federal guidelines on added sugar and sodium as they’re phased in, said Pratt-Heavner. For example, districts by July 2027 have to meet new limits on added sugars for the products they serve in their meals, which gives schools a natural opportunity to also flag products with dyes that have been targeted in states including California and West Virginia, she said.
The good news, Pratt-Heavner said, is that schools are already generally ahead of the curve when it comes to removing artificial dyes from their meals due to those more rigid federal nutrition guidelines.
“Artificial dyes in particular, that’s an area that the K-12 food service industry has already done a lot of work on,” she said. “A lot of the big companies that provide pre-prepared items that have dyes in them, many of them are saying, ‘Well, we’ve already taken out the artificial dyes in the K-12 space. Now we’re going to move that into the broader commercial retail sector.’”
Expect mistakes, and plan to fix them quickly
Ultimately, even the best-prepared districts will likely miss some foods with dyes on their menus, Derico said.
The key—if a ban is already in place—is to fix it once the problem is flagged.
“I made sure we did what we could to hopefully achieve the intent of the law, but by the same token I’ve been open-minded that I’ll probably make a mistake and overlook something from time to time,” Derico said. “But once we find that, I’m not going to bury my head in the sand, we’re going to fix it and find a solution.”
Work with other districts to stay compliant
Working with other districts and state leaders can ease the burden of complying with a new food dye ban, Derico said.
In West Virginia, a group of about 20 districts’ nutrition directors meet bimonthly to network and collaborate, and in recent months to share updates on products they’ve identified on their menus that violate the state’s new ban.
It was at one of those meetings that the nutrition director from another district shared that the instant mashed potatoes their district was using had a dye listed on the label. It was a surprise to everyone, Derico said, because mashed potatoes are white, and other districts might have overlooked the item.
“For me to say that I’m looking at every single label, that wouldn’t be fair,” Derico said. “That’s why it’s going to be in a partnership with other directors and even my frontline workers—my cafeteria managers—if when they’re using a product and they see something that’s banned on the label that we haven’t identified yet, they’ll let me know, and I’ll go from there.”
The West Virginia Department of Education’s child nutrition office also set up a shared database that districts can access to easily see if a product has been identified as having a banned dye, Derico said.
District leaders can also add products to the database as they identify them, he said.
