The Truth About Processed Foods and Health Risks

I’m going to deviate from my usual topics to talk about something this week that’s been a passion of mine long before the Trump Administration adopted the Make America Healthy Again platform by appointing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services.

Recently, I was in Costco wearing my Make America Healthy Again hat when an employee and I kept passing each other in the aisles. He eventually approached me and said, “I’ve been thinking about your hat. When was America ever healthy?” He was in his thirties and I thought to myself he probably grew up eating fast food and processed foods so prevalent today. I responded, “I think when my grandmother made everything from scratch.” He nodded and agreed.

Then it hit me that I’m now a grandmother. Like many women today, I’ve worked all my adult life with little time for making homemade bread, spaghetti sauce, yummy bakery products, or raising chickens like my grandmother who stayed home and raised seven children. However, since my first career was as a Registered Dietitian, I’ve always tried to avoid processed foods, eat fresh organic, and read labels.

Processed and ready-made foods started becoming popular in the 1960’s when more moms went to work and were trying to get dinner on the table quickly for the family after a long workday. The FDA began approving many additives and preservatives that didn’t have any history of being tested for safety. Today, most of them are still being used with many more added and at the same time there’s been a dramatic increase in childhood obesity and diabetes, breast cancer even in young women, colon cancer, infertility, and chronic diseases in children and adults. Could it be that we’ve been a human experiment?

Processed foods are more convenient and less expensive than fresh, but at what price to our bodies that God designed to consume real whole food?! By definition, processed food has been altered from its natural state. Processed foods have been treated with additive chemicals to enhance color, flavor, and increase shelf life. They’re moneymakers for manufacturers who aren’t always willing to monitor themselves while their lobbyists have more control than scientists and doctors over what’s considered healthy for consumption by the FDA.

Until Now!

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is putting a spotlight on what Americans eat! He says, “Food is medicine and we’re poisoning ourselves and our children with ultra-processed foods. Studies show increased anxiety and depression related to food, not to mention obesity. By changing your diet, you can lose some of those diagnoses. People should be able to make their own informed choices.”

Eating healthy shouldn’t be political. There are no Democrat or Republican children.

WebMD Chief Medical Officer Dr. John Whyte, echoes the Secretary of HHS, “Food really is medicine,” he said. “It’s as powerful as a prescription drug. It impacts every system of your body . . . There’s so much food that we consume that’s processed and, even more concerning, ultra-processed . . . I’m concerned about how long some of these foods last. What’s in them that’s allowing them to stay in your pantry for a couple of years?””

You might pay a little bit more for clean food, but it’s a better choice than spending less for something that could cause expensive health issues later and might actually be poison!

America has 10,000 inflammation causing food additives that are illegal in other countries. Think about that! McDonald’s French fries in Europe have three ingredients; in the US they have 17 ingredients! That’s crazy!

Additives to Avoid!

• Food Dyes

Red Dye No. 3, approved for use in foods since 1907, was banned from use in topical drugs and cosmetics in 1990 when the FDA determined that the dye causes cancer when eaten by animals. But it continued to be allowed in foods, supplements, and oral drugs until now, 35 years later!

Finally, it’s being exposed as potentially harmful and food manufacturers must remove this dye by January 2027 and from ingested drugs by January 2028. Some states are also banning Red Dye No. 40, Yellow Dye No. 5, Yellow Dye No. 6, Blue Dye No. 1, Blue Dye No. 2 and Green Dye. Hopefully, this will soon be nationwide, but you don’t need to wait until then. STOP buying foods with dyes NOW.

These dyes are commonly found in breakfast cereals, soft drinks, dairy products, candy, jellies, packaged pudding, Jell-O, even condiments and canned foods. I actually saw red dye added to meat, and I’m sure you’ve seen salmon with the sticker “color added.” It’s safe to assume that these dyes are on the ingredient lists for thousands of products.

Manufacturers use these dyes made out of crude oil because they’re cheap. Yet, they make some of the same products healthier for other countries, which ban dyes. For example, Fruit Loops are colored with carrot and beet juice in other countries, but Fruit Loops in America use six colored dyes and are currently at the top of the previous administration’s FDA’s food pyramid. There’s no fruit in Fruit Loops! That’s deceptive advertising, but there is about 12 grams of sugar in every serving. Food dyes are also tied to ADHD, cancer, learning disorders, and neurological issues.

• Seed Oils

This is another area highlighted as damaging that sounds healthy, but they’re not. Recent research links seed oils to cellular changes in our bodies. A 2023 study found that people who consumed high amounts of seed oils, highly used in processed foods, showed a 23% increase in inflammatory markers compared to cooking fats such as olive oil, avocado oil, or coconut oil. Avoid these seed oils due to their industrial processing methods and unbalanced fatty acid profiles: canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, safflower oil, grapeseed oil, rice bran oil, vegetable oil.

• Emulsifiers

Emulsifiers are food additives used to improve texture and extend shelf life. Researchers analyzed data from 92,000 adults over 7 years and found that certain emulsifiers significantly increased cancer risk. Mono & diglycerides of fatty acids (E471) found in processed and baked goods, margarine, and ice cream were linked to:

15% higher risk of overall cancer

24% higher risk of breast cancer

46% higher risk of prostate cancer

Other dangerous food additives added to enhance addicting flavor and texture are sodium nitrate, sodium phosphate, corn syrup, high-fructose corn syrup, aspartame, caramel color, trans fats, monosodium glutamate, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, BHA, evaporated cane juice, modified food starch, guar gum, and carrageenan.

I want to talk about carrageenan specifically because I’m a 3x breast cancer survivor and recently diagnosed with microscopic colitis. Carrageenan (E407 & E407a) is used as a thickening agent in dairy alternatives and also found in deli meats and plant-based products. It’s linked to 32% higher risk of breast cancer and also linked to colitis and inflammation. I don’t eat those food products, but then I started doing more research and discovered that carrageenan is in many foods that you would never expect. For example: dairy whipping cream, canned whipping cream, cottage cheese, protein drinks, yogurt, Costco rotisserie chicken, packaged pulled pork, peanut butter, and so much more!

I was shocked, especially with the Costco chicken until I discovered that carrageenan gives chicken an appealing appearance making it look fuller, plumper, and more succulent…just like those chickens you grab from Costco and take home for a quick dinner.

When I started looking closely at the ingredient label from most cottage cheese brands, this long list of italicized additives is typical: Cultured nonfat milk, milk, whey, salt, cornstarch, mono and diglycerides, carrageenan, locust bean gum, guar gum, phosphate, monopotassium phosphate, cream, natural and artificial flavor. Compare those sixteen ingredients with “Daisy” brand’s three ingredients: Cultured skim milk, cream, salt. That’s all that should be in cottage cheese! Remember that they list ingredients in order from the highest to the least content.

While I was at Walmart buying cottage cheese, an elderly woman came up to buy a carton. As she picked up one of the brands, I asked if I could show her the difference in the ingredients. When she saw only three ingredients in Daisy brand compared to a long list in others, she said, “I can pay a dollar more for a healthier brand. Thank you for showing me this.”

Avoid processed, boxed, quick, just add water products, pre-packaged, and precooked meals. Shop at local farmer’s markets, do frozen if you can’t do fresh, but fresh is best. Be your own chef. Cook your own meals so you know what you’re eating. There’s no comparison between homemade like my grandmother used to make and prepackaged, but we’ve become accustomed to settling for less.

It does take a little longer shopping to read all the ingredients, especially when they intentionally make the print small. If there’s more than 5 ingredients, or an additive or ingredient you can’t pronounce, you probably shouldn’t buy that product anyway. The manufacturers are hoping you won’t bother to notice and just pick up the cheapest one.

 But once you’ve determined a healthy brand of foods you typically buy, you’ll be able to quickly select that one and avoid all the others. As the little lady at Walmart so wisely said, spending a little extra for a healthier food to save your health in the end is a bargain.

Food is the fuel that keeps your body running. Just like you wouldn’t put the wrong gas or oil into your car engine that you want to last a few years, be wise about the fuel you put into your own body that you hope will last you for ninety or one hundred years!

Mark Hyman, MD says, “Cancer is complex and multifactorial, but one thing is certain: the food we eat plays a massive role in shaping our long-term health. Cutting out ultra-processed foods and focusing on whole, nutrient-dense foods is one of the most powerful steps you can take to reduce disease risk.”

The Five Disappoints!

Occasionally, I watch The Five on FOX TV while I’m doing something in the kitchen. They were discussing Coca-Cola coming out with a new product replacing manufactured high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) with real sugar, as it already does in countries like Mexico and the UK. High Fructose corn syrup is made from cornstarch, not sugar and in the 1970’s it started being used because it’s cheaper and has a longer shelf life.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made phasing out HFCS a key part of his “Make America Healthy Again” agenda, once calling it “poison” and criticizing it for fueling the nation’s obesity and diabetes crises. Research also shows HFCS may be more likely to promote fat buildup in the liver and contribute to insulin resistance because it contains a higher ratio of fructose to glucose than can sugar.

I’m not promoting drinking Coke nor eating sugar. I don’t have either in my house. But The Five panel was making light of this change by Coca-Cola as not being significant. Then they defended Fruit Loops saying Americans like what they’re used to even if it’s not healthy for you?! They also discounted Governors trying to get real food into children’s school lunches saying kids really only like snack foods and soft drinks.

I was shocked as I listened to them even ridicule the attempts of RFK Jr. to help Americans, especially our children, be introduced to foods that will make them healthier and not sicker. Then I thought back to why I gave up my career as a Registered Dietitian. It was such a thankless profession because just like The Five said, people like their sugar and foods they’ve become accustomed to, even if it’s killing them!

Why do you spend your money on junk food, your hard-earned cash on cotton candy? Listen to me, listen well: Eat only the best, fill yourself with only the finest. Pay attention, come close now, listen carefully to my life-giving, life-nourishing words. Is. 55:2-4 The Message

If you enjoyed this article, I’ll share more in an upcoming blog about Reading Labels.

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Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash