A recent study analyzing food allergen recalls in the UK from 2016–2021 has revealed allergens to be the most prevalent cause, and milk to be the most commonly implicated allergen.
Recall data from the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA) for the dates January 1, 2016–December 31, 2021 was collected for the study. To supplement FSA recall and allergy alert data, information was also gathered from Food Standards Scotland (FSS) recall alerts and the UK National Archives. Important to note is that the study only focused on recalls of prepackaged food from recall alerts reported by FSA or FSS publicly, and did not include food allergen-related cases not reported on public product recall alert platforms.