Food for thought

In all that time the food industry has, with alacrity, continued to turn our food supply into a minefield as more Americans have become overweight, obese and generally unhealthy. Consider the lifestyles of so many of today’s Americans and our intrepid food industry only concerned with the bottom line. Add the unwillingness of so many people to give up their self-indulgent habits and who really don’t care enough to make changes in their diets and the lack of nutrition education that would promote better health. 

Of course, corporate interests would like us to believe that it doesn’t matter what we eat so long as we burn off those calories with exercise. But it isn’t just weight-gain that should concern us. Consuming the usual American diet, overweight or not, we are very likely to be malnourished, which often greatly compromises health. Related corporate interests will keep trying to fool us into believing that they have our best interest at heart when they make such changes as removing a bit of trans-fat here, adding a little whole grain there, decreasing sugar or using sugar substitutes, but most such altered products will basically remain junk food.

“Most of us … can recognize how food companies spend money on advertising, but it is far more difficult to know about the industry’s behind-the-scenes efforts in Congress, federal agencies, courts, universities and professional organizations to make diets seem like a matter of personal choice rather than deliberate manipulation.” — Marian Nestle, “Food Politics.” Add that to the messages prevalent in this culture to live like there’s no tomorrow and indulge now and pay later, and there is very little hope that there will be anything but token change in the way most Americans eat.

With a president who is reported to eat fast food burgers every day and continually swills diet soft drinks, we can’t expect any help from the current administration to improve the quality of our food. Considering Trump’s allegiance to corporate interests, the few regulations that now exist will no doubt be ignored and none will be forthcoming. Corporate interests will increasingly be free to produce innovative products that lack nutrition and/or are loaded with chemical additives that have never been adequately tested. Note how Monsanto has been allowed to carry on in the United States in spite of the fact that there is no proof that GMO products are safe in the long term.

If related government agencies were sincere about “a more healthy country,” they would publish a long list of products that anyone serious about eating healthfully would avoid. Included would be, among many other products, all high sucrose, nutritionally devoid drinks — especially sodas. Add processed and high-fat meats, anything containing hydrogenated fat, all but the simplest packaged or ready prepared products and anything containing a lot of saturated fat, sweeteners and sodium. We would be advised to prepare our own food from organic sources, select carefully as much as possible when eating out and eschew fast foods. As Michael Pollan wrote in his book, “Food Rules”: “If it comes from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t.”

Whatever type of graphic like the food pyramid that government comes up with every few years may be helpful for the few Americans who will attempt to eat healthier, but real change will not happen. The situation being what it is, drastic action would need to be taken. Marjorie Freedman, assistant professor of nutrition at San Jose State University, warned us years ago: “Unless we radically alter our food system to make healthier food less expensive and more available to the population at large, we will not solve the problem.”

Kathleen Sebelius no doubt had good intentions, but as long as corporate interests call the shots, the changes in our eating habits needed to make our country more “competitive and prosperous” will not come to pass. Is that the price we pay for “progress?”

Since 1984, Dorothy Dimitre has written more than 900 columns for various local newspapers. Her email address is gramsd@aceweb.com.