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Healthier McDonald’s Options Available in Europe, but Not in the US
People can get healthier McDonalds in Europe, food activist Vani Hari said at a recent Senate roundtable discussion.
For instance, in the U.S., McDonald’s fries contain 11 ingredients, while the U.K. version has only three, with salt being optional.
Hari highlighted this disparity during her testimony at the Sen. Ron Johnson roundtable, American Health and Nutrition: A Second Opinion, revealing how many U.S. foods are laden with unsafe chemicals banned in other Western countries.
The Epoch Times verified that U.S. McDonald’s fries contain 10 or more ingredients, while the U.K. version has three or more ingredients.
How can a food additive be considered risky in other countries yet deemed safe in America?
“The problem is the law — there’s nothing that requires the industry to submit safety data,” Jennifer Pomeranz, associate professor of public health policy and management at NYU School of Global Public Health, told The Epoch Times.
“As a result, companies can just self-regulate and designate ingredients as GRAS [generally recognized as safe] without notifying the FDA or the public.”
Her recent research published in the American Journal of Public Health sheds light on this legal loophole, allowing unsafe ingredients in the U.S. food supply.
Majority of Americans Eat Inflammatory Diets, Study Says
As many as 57% of Americans may be eating a diet that promotes inflammation, raising the risk of diseases such as heart disease, obesity, diabetes, depression and certain cancers, research by Ohio State University has found.
“Chronic inflammation occurs when the immune system is overstimulated for long periods of time — months or years,” lead author Rachel Meadows, from Ohio State’s College of Public Health, told Newsweek.
“It can be caused by stress or unhealthy lifestyle behaviors like diet or smoking. Chronic inflammation contributes to the initiation and progression of many chronic health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, and depression.”
Some foods may contribute to this process — pro-inflammatory — while others have been shown to mitigate it — anti-inflammatory.
Microbiome-directed Food Speeds Recovery in Children With Severe Acute Malnutrition, Trial Finds
A team of biologists, nutritionists and gut biome specialists has found via a trial run at several hospitals in Bangladesh that giving children suffering from severe malnutrition a microbiome-based food helps them recover faster than giving them ready-to-use therapeutic or supplementary foods (RUFs).
For many years, the standard of care for children suffering from severe acute malnutrition has been feeding them RUFs, which are generally made by mixing peanuts, oil, butter and sugar into a quantity of powdered milk.
Such a mix provides a lot of calories in a hurry, helping children who are starving recover as quickly as possible.
In this new study, published in Science Translational Medicine, the researchers have found that a different kind of food might be a better option.
Center for Food Safety Endorses Toxic Free Foods Act to Overhaul FDA Chemical Regulations
Center For Food Safety reported:
Center for Food Safety (CFS) is endorsing the Toxic Free Foods Act, legislation re-introduced last week by Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) that would overhaul the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) process for determining the safety of chemicals used in the food supply.
For years, FDA has allowed food manufacturers to designate various chemicals as “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS), without FDA review or public notice.
The Toxic Free Food Act would require FDA to close the so-called GRAS loophole and make the industry’s chemical food additives subject to FDA approval.
“For years, FDA has allowed food and chemical companies to decide whether long-lasting toxic chemicals, such as PFAS [per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances] or orthophthalates, are safe to eat.
“The Toxic Free Food Act will make FDA take charge of food safety instead of the industry,” said CFS Policy Director Jaydee Hanson.
Under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, FDA is required to review and confirm the safety of any food additives before they enter the food supply.
Under FDA’s GRAS rule, however, the agency allowed food manufacturers to bypass these reviews and instead make safety determinations in secret.
Congress initially created the GRAS exemption to cover ingredients that are widely known to be safe, such as vegetable oil, but the rule has been applied in recent years to cover novel chemicals and is now a de facto loophole that has swallowed the law.
Time Runs out for the Farm Bill
The Farm Bill is kaput.
Congress has failed to extend or replace the 2018 Farm Bill by the Sept. 30 deadline, meaning it has expired.
Officially known as the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, the 2018 farm bill is the most recent omnibus farm bill.
It contained 12 titles.
In Nov. 2023, Congress enacted a one-year extension to 2024.
But all that time has now run out.
The nearly $900 billion bill is dead, but some of its spending will continue through the end of the year.
That means the current Congress has little time to work on the issue, or it will have to leave it to the new Congress that takes over in January.
