Food Day Series: What’s in a Name? Get Educated About Food

What’s in a Name? Get Educated About Food

By: Nicole Hayes

What’s in a bag? What’s in a box? It’s a surprise, but not a gift. Most bagged, boxed, canned and pre-packaged foods contain “surprises”—called additives.  They are names you can’t pronounce and whose affects can harm our bodies. For example, you’re watching your sugar intake but overlook an ingredient known as maltodextrin,(malto who??) a sugar derivative, a sweetner—and a carb alternative. Maltodextrin is found in most processed foods (and for those who work out), the additive is in many meal replacement and exercise performance products. Yikes! You’re trying to avoid one enemy (sugar) but unknowingly invite another (maltodextrin). To make matters worse, “refined sugar” hides under 30 or more names ending in “malt, “syrup” or “-ose.” Studies have shown that high a intake of sugar contributes to high blood sugar levels in the body, diabetes, heart disease, obesity and other issues. Sodium is another culprit whose levels in canned, frozen and processed foods exceed ten times or more of our body’s daily requirements. Monosodium glutamate (MSG), goes by many other names and is typically used as a flavor enhancer—but also considered an excitotoxin, upsetting and disturbing the nervous system.

Companies who prepare these foods will continue producing such items to satisfy consumer demand. Our busy lives and a desire to eat inexpensively drives the need for such foods. But our bodies are getting weary and worn ahead of their time, battered by a misunderstanding of how to preserve our health. Our bodies were highly designed to perform well and beyond what we’re witnessing today. Fortunately, many people are making the switch by cooking meals from scratch, eating what nature grows and not what science manufactures. Our access to knowledge is a keystroke away if we choose to accept accountability and responsibility for what we consume. Either the food you’re eating is real or it isn’t. Get educated.

“Companies propose curbing junk food ads for kids?”

“Companies propose curbing junk food ads for kids?”

The nation’s largest food companies say they will cut back on advertising unhealthy foods to children. The move by General Mills, Kellogg and other industry giants comes as the federal government released stricter standards for marketing junk food to children.

An online search did not produce a copy of the coalition’s new marketing standards. That’s not good. Without access to the standards, there’s no way to measure change and hold the food marketers accountable.

Childhood obesity in America has more than tripled in the past 30 years. Junk food consumption is linked to the alarming increase. Let’s do more than hope that the companies are on the up and up. Let’s demand to see their new marketing standards.

New Report Shows America Getting Fatter

New Report Shows America Getting Fatter

Continuing from yesterday's blog post on the efforts to combat childhood obesity, looks like the adults are not leading by example. According to a new report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation obesity rates among adults now exceed 25 percent in more than two-thirds of the states. Not a single state had a decline in weight and rates actually climbed in 16 states. It was the Southern states who seem to be dragging down the rest of the country, with Mississippi taking the record again for being the fattest state in the nation. Colorado came out on top as the fittest, and as the only state with an obesity rate under 20 percent.

With all the attention being paid these days to fighting obesity, getting fit, working out, eating healthy, to see the country continue to slide in the wrong direction is extremely disheartening. One has to wonder what it will take to snap the country from it's addiction to fatty foods.

To read more on this report visit: http://prescriptions.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/07/f-is-for-americans-getting-fatter/

Babies and Food Giants

Babies and Food Giants

Photo caption: In Motts for Tots apple juice, a popular fruit juice parents serve their children, a 200ml serving comes with 13 grams of sugar and 50 calories. An equal-sized serving of Safeway brand apple juice dishes up about 23 grams of sugar and 93 calories.

 

An article on CNN today draws attention to a growing epidemic of obesity in infants. Several factors come into play to affect a child’s health, but one issue of growing importance is nutrition labeling. Often, parents just aren’t aware of what they’re feeding their children. "There's a disconnect in people's minds. The mothers don't know. They're used to thinking juice is good; juice is fruit. What they don't tell them is all the sugar in the package," says Dr. Sandeep Gupta, director of Pediatric Overweight Education and Research Program at Indiana University Health. At a stage when physical and mental health development is critically important and equally sensitive, why isn’t more being done to protect kids by enlightening parents?

One answer: Lobbying. In a summary of a recent opinion piece by Kelly Brownell (director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University), the issue of the food industry’s lobbying capabilities comes into plain view. As the U.S. Food and Drug Administration attempts to redesign and clarify the traditional food label, more direct grouping may not be an option. “Food industry’s powerful lobby would block such a black-and-white system that categorized every food as either healthy or unhealthy.”

 

 

So for now, parents are stuck with labels depicting quantitative components, rather than an understandable translation of what they’re actually getting. And the babies are paying the price.

Troubling Trend: More Young Adults Living With Diabetes

Troubling Trend: More Young Adults Living With Diabetes

When we are young we think we can avoid health-related issues that happen to “to the other older person.” By that, meaning we can consume all the chips, fries, burgers, pastries, pizza and sodas we want, believing that time and youth can reverse any possible damage? Wrong. According to leading diabetes experts, more people in their 20s and 30s are coping with Type 2 diabetes, which used to be rare in those under 40. Younger type 2 diabetes patients are not just worried about college, dating and entertainment choices but now trying to participate in such activities with high blood pressure, poor eyesight, obesity, kidney problems and possibly congestive heart failure. It just doesn’t happen to the “older guy.” Healthy food choices are important at every age. We shouldn’t let an early death win.

For more on this troubling trend, read USA Today article.

Health Equity and Health Reform are Related, But Not the Same

Health Equity and Health Reform are Related,

But Not the Same

“Is inequality making us sick?” Unnatural Causes asked that insightful question when the seven-part documentary debuted on PBS in 2009. Produced by California Newsreel, the series explored the impact that socio-economic and racial inequities have on health and, in doing, framed a new prism for envisioning solutions to America’s health crisis. As America marks the first anniversary of the Affordable Care Act on March 23, we would do well to return to the wisdom uncovered by Unnatural Causes.  As the groundbreaking series points out, social determinants cause health disparities. Health reform is only a part of the solution for achieving health equity. Reforms in education, employment, and income must occur if all Americans are to be well.

Visit: http://www.unnaturalcauses.org/ for more!

Celebrate Black History Month by Cutting Down on Salt

Celebrate Black History Month by Cutting Down on Salt

Black History Month begins today.  Let’s honor the hard-won achievements of African Americans by taking steps to improve our health.  We gotta be in shape to run the race to the top. One easy step is to cut back on our salt intake.  New federal dietary guidelines urge African Americans to reduce sodium consumption to roughly a teaspoon a day. The decrease will help fight and prevent high blood pressure, diabetes, and chronic kidney disease – all conditions that are common among African Americans.

Highlighted Clip for Tuesday, February 1, 2011:

MARY CLARE JALONICK

The new dietary guidelines, issued every five years by the Agriculture and Health and Human Services departments, are telling people who are 51 and older, African-American or suffering from high blood pressure, diabetes or chronic kidney disease to cut the amount of sodium they eat daily to little more than half a teaspoon.

Cut down on salt, government says _ and calories

New U.S. Dietary Guidelines Focus on Salt Reduction - Targets African Americans

New U.S. Dietary Guidelines Focus on Salt Reduction -

Targets African Americans

Today, the Federal Government provided new and improved dietary guidelines for all Americans, and are the first new guidelines since 2005. The new guidelines focus mostly on salt intake, recommending that Americans limit their daily sodium intake to less than 2,300 milligrams (about a teaspoon) a day for most people. However, as a strong statement to the African-American population, the guidelines go further suggesting that they cut their salt intake even further to less thatn 1,5000 milligrans. These sharper guidelines also apply to people aged 51 or older, and people who have hypertension, diabetes, or chronic kidney disease, regardless of their age. While it's true that statistics show African Americans suffer from these diseases at a disproportionate rate when compared to the rest of the American population, we wonder why the stricter guidelines wouldn't just be applied to all Americans, considering the current obesity crisis in this country. What do you think? Are the targeted guidelines for different races, ages, etc. a progressive approach to tackle problems in those specific communities, or would a general diagnosis for all Americans prove more worth-while?

Highlighted Clip for Monday, January 31, 2011:

New U.S. diet guidelines urge less salt, more dairy

Nanci Hellmich

Many Americans' diets are a train wreck loaded with junk food, fast food, sugary beverages and too few healthful foods.

Fighting Back Against Childhood Obesity

Fighting Back Against Childhood Obesity

Agriculture Secretary, Tom Vilsack, proposed Thursday to overhaul nutrition guidelines that will reduce sodium, sugar and caloric consumption in public schools.  This is good news, since nearly one-third of today’s children are either obese or at-risk for being obese – a problem that will cost the U.S. nearly $344 billion in additional health care costs by 2018. While good nutrition is essential to maintaining a healthy weight, we should not forget the equally important fact that a healthy diet and exercise go hand-in-hand in fighting obesity. 



Highlighted Clip for Wednesday, January 12, 2011:

School nutrition-guideline changes sought to fight obesity

Tim Carman

Calling it not only a national health issue but also a military one, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on Thursday proposed to overhaul the nutrition guidelines …