Additives: Beneficial Or Disturbing?

Does the advantage of food additives outweigh their concerning side effects?

What exactly are food additives?

According to The World Health Organization, food additives are “substances that are added to maintain or improve the safety, freshness, taste, texture or appearance of food.”

Natural preservatives such as salt, sugar and vinegar have been used for many years as food additives. As new substances were invented, additives with more complex names such as acesulfame potassium and butylated hydroxytoluene began to appear on ingredient lists.

Medium’s spellcheck doesn’t even recognize the underlined portions as words!

There are many reasons why food additives have become so popular. They enhance shelf life for preservation, promote color stability and enrich foods with nutrients.

In the United States, there are over 3,000 additives put into food products with some being FDA approved and many not being reviewed or monitored for safety.

This controversial topic includes one perspective that believes food additives do not have a noticeable impact on the long-term health effects of humans. Conversely, the other perspective believes food additives cause more harm than good and that they need to be more closely monitored by the FDA.

This article explains reasons and facts of both perspectives.

Perspective 1 — Food additives are not a cause for concern

This perspective believes food additives don’t affect our overall health, but rather benefit our society as a whole. A lot of people requires a lot of food.

Pew Research Center found “Seven-in-ten Americans (70%) believe that science has had a mostly positive effect on the quality of food in the United States…

half believes the average person is exposed to potentially threatening additives in such small amounts that there is no serious risk.”

In other words, the system of putting additives into food solves the problem of needing to feed a rapidly growing population. Moreover, a large portion of the population supports this perspective because several large companies have committed to switch to all-natural ingredients, free from food dyes and preservatives.

Several large companies, including Mars, Kellogg, and General Mills publicly pledged to eliminate artificial dyes back in 2015.

But the sad reality is these promises were not kept.

Skittles still contain Red 40, Yellow 5 & 6, Blue 1 & 2 :(

According to an article by Food Dye’s Senior Reporter Megan Poinski, “None of these companies met their original goals on colors. The deadlines they set for themselves came and went, and the brightest items in each company’s portfolio still get their vibrant colors from synthetic food dyes.”

So even though the public was told that companies were working on transitioning to natural dyes, it was simply not true.

Perspective 2 — Food additives create a cause for concern

This perspective believes food additives are unnecessary and detrimental to our health. This perspective thinks there needs to be more monitoring of these additives and it is unjust for the FDA to allow, but not regulate hundreds of chemicals.

For instance, let’s look at food dyes. Products containing food dyes include bread, gatorade, breakfast cereals, canned fruit, yogurt, and so much more. But the surprising truth to food dyes, such as yellow number 5 or red number 40 is how they are derived from petroleum, like gasoline.

These dyes inhibit nerve-cell development and are directly linked to hyperactivity and long-term neurological effects for children, resulting in behavioral disorders such as ADHD, OCD, Autism, learning disorders, anxiety and many more.

The FDA’s lack regulation for additives causes victims to need treatment later on in life.

Research from UNC Asheville found an average of 43% of kids’ diets contains artificial dyes. This additive is banned in Norway, Austria and several other countries.

Due to their carcinogenic properties, these food dyes are also proven to cause cancer.

This is just one of the many thousands of additives that go into American food. Several other ingredients, such as brominated vegetable oil and potassium bromate are proven to induce numerous illnesses ranging from birth defects and schizophrenia, to memory loss and organ system damage.

In summary, there are sound reasons for both sides of this issue. However, as a society, we must take the initiative to educate ourselves on this topic.

When you get right down to it, the entire U.S. food production system is in desperate need of everyone working together.

We must come together and demand the FDA scientifically studies what effects these foods have on generations to come.

Click below to sign EWG’s petition to get chemicals out of our food:

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