Protective coating used for fruits and vegetables misrepresented to be harmful for the human body

Context

A Facebook user recently claimed that the ‘Apeel’ label stuck on fruits and vegetables is harmful for the human body, and that products Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates invests in should be avoided since they are harmful. The user shared three pictures — one is an image of a cucumber with a sticker that reads "Apeel", and the other two pictures are pages from a safety data sheet of Apeel. Against the sub-head ‘Hazards Statements,’ the document reads, "Causes serious eye damage. May cause an allergic skin reaction. Harmful to aquatic life with long lasting effects." 

Sharing these images, the user claims, "Avoid anything labelled apeel, Bill Gates funding food that causes skin reactions, eye damage, harmful to the human body! Don't touch anything he's involved with...even a national emergency poison phone number,"

However, the safety data sheet of a different product has been misrepresented to claim that it is used to coat fruits and vegetables. 

In Fact

We found that the apeel logo on the sticker and the one on the safety document did not match. And with reverse image search of the logo found on the sticker, we discovered that the green coloured logo is that of Apeel Sciences. This California-based company produces a product called Edipeel, a thin protective coating that extends the shelf-life of fresh fruits and vegetables by reducing their spoiling rate. 

Similarly, the logo on the safety document represents a UK-based company called Evans Vanodine that manufactures a cleaning product under the same name, Apeel, which is a hard surface cleaner.

The safety document shared in the Facebook post can be found on the Evans Vanodine website. The product details, in fact, clarify: "Evans Apeel has not relation to Apeel Sceinces and should not be used to preserve fruits and vegetables." This explains that the safety document shared in the post is unrelated to Apeel Sciences. 

The product safety information of Apeel Edipeel on the company’s website states that it meets the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requirements and is a non-animal product. It notes that Edipeel contains a mixture of "food-grade glycerolipids derived from edible plant oils," which is safe and edible. The information adds that the product also includes diglycerides of fatty acids, on par with the specifications laid by the Food Chemicals Codex (FCC). Information on the website further affirms that a layer or a coating of these plant-derived chemicals keeps moisture inside the fruits and oxygen outside to reduce the oxidation of vegetables and fruits. 

Furthermore, it is also true that Apeel Sciences is funded by Gates, according to the press releases shared on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation website.

Gates and his foundation have always been targeted using several falsified conspiracy theories about COVID-19 pandemic, vaccines, climate change, and others which were clearly based on assumptions. Logically Facts has previously debunked such false accusations, including claims like he created the COVID-19 virus and later vaccines for profit.

The Verdict

The safety document of a cleaning product that goes by the same name, Apeel, has been incorrectly linked to claim that Apeel Edipeel, which produces an edible protective layer for fruits and vegetables is dangerous to the human body. Therefore, we have marked the claim as false.