The whitener banned from EU food in 2022 is still legal in your toothpaste. It's the same compound, CI 77891, pulled from cereal and cheese because regulators couldn't rule out genotoxicity, and under EU food law being unable to confirm safety is grounds enough to ban an additive. Cosmetics answer a narrower question, and it's still open. The EU's consumer-safety committee reviewed 84 grades of titanium dioxide and could clear only two of genotoxicity concern; for the rest, including the grades that fill most toothpaste, it said the evidence wasn't sufficient to rule the risk out. It didn't pull the ingredient because a cosmetic isn't swallowed on purpose. That assumption, not new toxicology, is the whole gap. A fresh opinion is due by the end of 2026. Until then, anyone selling you certainty in either direction is selling, not reporting.