STORY UPDATED: check for updates below.

No Wax Present

Do Kinder Joy candies contain a wax that causes cancer? No, there's no evidence of that: A post making the claim offers no proof or source to substantiate that claim. The manufacturer of the egg-shaped candy says there's no wax in Kinder Joy, and the ingredients list on the company website does not include wax. Also, the FDA says carcinogenic waxes are not permitted to be in foods per the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act.

The claim reappeared in a Facebook post (archived here) where it was published on January 29, 2020. The post read:

Food For Thought

KINDER JOY contains wax coating which is also used in Styrofoam containers. That is why Kinder Joy dont stick to each other when eating it. Our body needs upto two days to clean the wax. Make sure you stop eating Kinder Joy. This wax can cause CANCER. Share if you care.

This is what the post looked like on Facebook at the time of writing:

(Source: Facebook screenshot taken on Fri Oct 29 14:58:16 2021 UTC)

Kinder Joy is made by the Ferrero company. On the Kinder Joy website is a list of ingredients. In the ingredient list, wax is not present.

Lead Stories reached out to Ferrero for a comment on this claim. "Kinder Joy does not contain any sort of wax. The ingredients for Kinder Joy and all Kinder products are listed at Kinder.com," a Ferrero spokesperson told us in a November 3, 2021, email.

Concerning the wax part of the claim, a spokesperson for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) told us in an November 2, 2021, email:

In general, the term 'wax' refers to a diverse group of chemicals that are generally long chain fatty acids or lipids that are solid at room temperature ... Whether a wax is a carcinogen depends on the specific wax, however these types of waxes cannot lawfully be in food since carcinogens are prohibited from being added to food under the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act.

Whether a wax is digestible is determined by the types of fatty acids and lipids that make up the wax. Some waxes are fully digestible. Several waxes have been evaluated by the FDA and found to be safe for use in food and in food packaging (such as waxes used to wrap specialty cheeses).