Texas considers Maha style warning labels on popular foods

The relatively prudent approach to Europe’s food additives is the desire of the Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Make America Healthy Again movement. A Texas Bill now before governor Greg Abbott aims to help fill the gap by slapping the warning labels on foods that contain one of the 44 additives and dyes.

Abbott did not say if he intended to sign Bill 25 of the Senate. But if it does it, it will be the first of its kind in the United States, an experience in the use of warning labels on additives, rather than nutrients like salt or fat, to change the way people eat. It will also be a new test of the food industry, which will surely seek means to resist it. “If they cannot block or weaken, they delay,” said Eric Crosbie, political scientist at the University of Nevada, Reno’s School of Public Health.

Nutrition experts who spoke with Stat said that the jury was still on the quantity of food transformation itself can stimulate chronic diseases. They were also not aware of the research published on the question of whether the warning labels on additives have specifically improved public health results. But they have generally applauded the intention of the bill and its status as a sign of the growing interest of red states for policies aimed at improving the quality of food that Americans eat.

“I continue to be very excited by the fact that states that generally did not want to repel the food industry or do a lot to regulate it are now really in value,” said Christina Roberto, director of the Center for Food and Nutrition Policy at the University of Pennsylvania.

The bill, which also includes new requirements for nutritional education and physical activity for pupils in public schools, adopted the legislator with bipartisan support. From 2027, foods like Doritos and M & MS would be required to brandish high contrast labels with the expression “Warning: this product contains an ingredient which is not recommended for human consumption by the appropriate authority in Australia, Canada, the European Union or in the United Kingdom.” The ingredients covered by the bill include everything, from whitewashed flour and titanium dioxide to dyes which are already prohibited in the United States, such as red dye n ° 4, which Food and Drug Administration prohibited in 1976, and red dye n ° 3, which the FDA banned in January.

However, there are some important warnings. The requirement only applies to the labels of food products developed or protected by copyright in 2027 or after.

Consumer Brands Association, the largest trade group in the food industry representing manufacturers of packaged products, said that the ingredients for food supply are safe. “SB 25 labeling requirements oblige an inaccurate alert language, create legal risks for brands and stimulate consumers’ confusion and higher costs,” said John Hewitt, vice-president of the group’s state. “We urge Governor Abbott to oppose his veto to the bill and to protect the access of Texans to options for food and safe, affordable and practical drinks.”

Research shows that warning labels can be an effective way to move consumer behavior and can also push the food industry to make healthier versions of their products to avoid gifying alarming opinions on cookie and cereal boxes. The countries of Latin America, including Mexico and Chile, have introduced warning labels in recent years for foods that contain higher levels of sodium, added sugar and saturated fat – nutrients which, if consumed in excess, are largely understood as contributing to chronic diseases. And the FDA earlier this year proposed to add package labels that would highlight the levels of added sugar, sodium and saturated fats that a given food contains.

But Texas Bill Zéros in the additives instead, reflecting the particular concentration of the Maha movement on the regulatory flaw that enabled companies to present themselves in the ingredients of the food system which were not explicitly approved by the FDA. Calley means, a Maha leader and Special Advisor to Kennedy, approved the bill in February as a means of providing more transparency to the content of the Americans. The concerns about additives also go far beyond the Maha movement. A current New York bill would oblige food manufacturers to disclose ingredients added under the “type generally recognized as safe” or fat, regulatory escape from the State.

“If we think of these additives as being bad for health, this is the thing we want to regulate and we are not so worried about saturated fats or sodium, just the degree of treatment?” said Anna Grummon, director of the Stanford Food Policy Lab. “My opinion is that this is a question that we always unpack.”

Nutrition scientists like Kevin Hall, who recently left the National Institutes of Health about censorship concerns, tried to go to the bottom of the question of the reasons why heavy diets in ultra-transformed food tend to be associated with worst health results. There is not yet a final answer that it is because fries, cookies, etc. are generally rich in sodium, saturated fats and sugar – or if ingredients such as emulsifiers, thickness and gelling agents have a clean impact.

Certain foods, such as whole grain bread, may contain additives but always offer more nutritional advantages than, say, a croissant of butter and fresh chocolate. However, said Grummon, there is probably a lot of overlap between the foods that contain the 44 additives on the list and the foods that are not so healthy. “You don’t want perfect to be the enemy of good,” she said.

If the bill is promulgated, the experts expect that a series of industrial prosecution will follow, which – whether they prevail or not – can lead to its promulgation. They also note that the specific ingredients of distinction can lead to a game of Whac-A-Mole, as when Chile has seen an increase in the use of artificial sweeteners after introducing warning labels on added sugars. “They can always innovate and use other things where we don’t know if they are good or bad for us,” said Roberto. “This is why you need this type of global reform at the federal level.”

On the other hand, the laws in the city and at the level of the state sometimes stimulate federal action – for example, the calorie accounts which now appear on the menus of the restaurant chain nationwide have their roots in the local laws adopted by New York and Philadelphia. “I am more afraid that I was not hoping in this area,” said Crosbia. But there is still hope, he added: “Just the fact that Fox [News] And the conservatives talk about healthier food, it’s a good thing. »»

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