In an effort to live healthier lives, Americans are buying items at the grocery store that are deemed by the manufacturers to impart many wonderful health benefits: vitamin infused water to boost immunity to illness, heart healthy juices, products that promote lower cholesterol and a host of other rather grandiose claims, but do the facts live up to the hype?
Major food manufacturers make some amazing claims, but they never actually say that their products can cure or prevent disease or illness, or for that matter can even do what they claim. This would be breaking federal food regulation laws. Instead, they make claims, all perfectly legal, stating that their products may help to promote better health, weight loss and an array of issues that consumers are concerned with.
For example, claims like those made by Dannon Foods for their product Activia helping to promote regularity have been determined to be false since according to studies done by regulators it would require consumers to eat Activia three times a day to have improved regularity and neither their packaging nor advertising state this fact.
Kellogg’s claim that their Frosted Mini-Wheats cereal helps children to have better focus when eating it for breakfast were negligible as well. Studies showed that children eating the Frosted Mini-Wheats might be a little more alert and focused for the first three or so hours, but there was virtually no difference for test subjects after the first couple hours using a placebo as opposed to the actual products. In the study group sponsored by Kellogg, half the children had only water for breakfast, while the other half ate the cereal, but this was never publicly mentioned by Kellogg.
Food manufacturers call these types of products “functional foods” and claim that they promote health or aid in maintaining wellness, and if they can support this with actual, reliable scientific evidence, it remains legal.
You don’t have to spend too much money to get healthy foods, the Mediterranean diet is rich of those types of foods…here some examples: Garlic health benefits – Apples health benefits – Tomato health benefits – Almonds health benefits – Spinach heath benefits – Olive oil health benefits – Fish health benefits – Broccoli health benefits – Red wine health benefits …and much more!
The problem is that over the last few years, the demand for whole, healthy and health-enhancing foods has become big business, and in turn, even bigger profits for the food manufacturers. This means that already overworked health regulators are having a hard time keeping up with the new products being introduced into the market.
The conflicting evidence can by very confusing to both consumers and to health professionals but with a little research and reading more than just the claims on the label, we can all be better informed and avoid falling for the hype.
