In today’s 24/7 media environment, news and information on any topic is readily available to anyone with a computer, laptop, or smartphone. Consumers are overwhelmed with information from many sources. Given the sheer amount of information about food and health, consumers often find it difficult to identify what is accurate and evidence based. Moreover, information about food ingredient safety can be very difficult to evaluate especially given the complicated balance of risk vs. health hazard.  In the United States (US), safety assessments for ingredients, for example, are determined partly by the potential risk of an adverse health outcome and not solely by the hazard itself. In the European Union (EU), safety assessments focus primarily on the hazard; the actual adverse health outcome. Therein lies the impact of varying global assessments and consumer confusion about ingredient safety. One example is the EU ban of titanium dioxide, a color additive pigment approved for use in food, drugs, cosmetics, and sunscreen products. In 2021, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) determined it “no longer safe as a food additive.”[i] The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) still considers it safe for use in food.[ii] This is just one example of many that represent the growing challenge of emerging diverse scientific interpretations and underscore a divergence of global safety assessments. Speaker: Eyassu Abegaz, PhD