Earlier today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration determined that partially hydrogenated oils can no longer be "generally recognized as safe," opening a 60-day consultation period "to collect additional data and to gain input on the time potentially needed for food manufacturers to reformulate products that currently contain artificial trans fat should this determination be finalized." Partially hydrogenated oils are commonly found in processed foods such as desserts, frozen food, and microwave popcorn in the form of trans fat; as a study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determined that "[a]voiding foods containing artificially produced trans fat could prevent 10,000 to 20,000 heart attacks and 3,000 to 7,000 coronary heart disease deaths each year," the ban would label partially hydrogenated oils as additives, thus requiring approval for them to be used in food. Areas such as California and New York City have already banned the use of trans fat in restaurants, while McDonald's and other restaurants have already stopped using it in their food items. The ban would not apply to trans fat that is naturally found in meat and dairy products.
Personally, upon reading about the proposed ban, I was a bit skeptical. I don't know much about trans fat and the research that links the consumption of trans fat with an increased risk of heart disease, but I feel that the ban on trans fat doesn't necessarily improve circumstances: in the absence of partially hydrogenated oils, fast food chains and food manufacturers will turn to (or have already turned to) other sources of oil that are likely to present undesirable health risks as well. But then again, this may be an instance of choosing the option that presents the lesser evil.
What do you think - is this a step in the right direction? Even though the proposal may be imperfect, does its merits outweigh its shortcomings?
http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/health/2013/11/07/exp-cohen-fda-to-ban-trans-fat.cnn.html [video]
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/08/health/fda-trans-fats.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
6 comments:
Personally I think that this is a step in the right direction. While many people will argue against this ban as being anti-choice, I think this a case in which the consumers' preference is not properly represented because, with partially hydrogenated oils in seemingly every food these days, people cannot demonstrate their preference by not eating food. Of course people can go out of their way to find foods without partially hydrogenated oils (like my mom), but that's a pretty inconvenient task to have to go through every time you go to the grocery store, and most major brands seem to use PHO pretty liberally. Overall I think that this proposal is beneficial for consumers over the long run.
I realize I didn't write much about how the ban might affect consumers; I agree, though, with Quinn that the ban should ultimately benefit consumers - without the ban, those who care to avoid partially hydrogenated oils are forced to manually filter the foods they buy for PHOs, while those unaware of PHOs and their associated health concerns may put themselves at great risk by unknowingly consuming foods abounding in PHOs.
I think that the ban is a step in the right direction, especially if this country is trying to eliminate obesity and decrease the amount of preventable causes of medical issues among Americans. I don't think the ban should cause much uproar among citizens because it is ultimately for their own good, if a product used in many foods has caused harm, it should be eliminated to protect the people.
As a person who consumes far too much of this product, I concur with the previous comments and echo their sentiments. Although many argue that it is not the duty or even a right of the government to decide what we can or cannot consume, I believe that government should step in when it can perform an action that can deliver overwhelmingly obvious good to society with little backlash from the public.
I think it's a good step in terms of government taking action. It's nice to see the government working to improve the health of the nation. There could always be more we can do to be healthier. But in the end, its up to the consumer, like Quinn said, to make healthy choices. I don't know how big of an impact banning PHO will be, but I agree that it would bring some benefit.
Post a Comment