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News : Sales of pork rinds jumped 37 percent in 2003
SFA, July 1 2005 -- According to the Snack Food Association, sales of pork rinds jumped 37 percent in 2003 when several brands began labeling them as a low-carb food. The chief executive of one pork rind company proclaimed, without irony, "We’re now appearing in the ‘better-for-you’ section of the grocery aisle."
It was another case of a hopeful public latching on to a trend (unless it was just a good excuse to eat pork rinds).
One problem with such food trends, says Jeanne Goldberg (G59, N86), a professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy, is that Americans, it appears, would rather add an item to their diets than take something away. So they happily comply with a recommendation to add two tablespoons of olive oil to their daily diets because the fat in olive oil is monounsaturated. People who do that, however, add about 250 calories to their daily diets, so unless they remove something else, they are increasing their caloric intake and virtually guaranteeing weight gain.
Goldberg points out that the "heart-healthy" portion of oatmeal is actually 50 percent larger than the single serving, so getting the full benefit means taking in 50 percent more calories.
Marion Nestle, a professor at New York University, has coined the term "calorie distracters" to refer to this phenomenon of food fixation. The problem with foods deemed beneficial, Nestle has said, is that people believe they have permission "to eat as much of them as they want."
In the case of pork rinds, consumers were attracted to the "low-carb" designation because of its near synonymy with the popular Atkins-style weight-loss diets. More overt is an actual health claim on a food, which draws a connection between a food or food component and a disease or health condition. The flapping wings of a health claim can lead to a hurricane of public interest and consumption.
Yet labeling foods with health claims has gotten easier. Since 2003, the Food and Drug Administration has given greater leeway to food distributors in labeling, allowing "qualified" health claims on certain products. Prior to the new policy, the standard was much higher, requiring food distributors to provide proof of "significant scientific agreement" surrounding their claims. The regulations remain tight enough, however, so that food labels contain a number of non-negotiable phrases. For example, FDA regulations require that walnuts, the first food approved for a qualified claim under the rules, include the following on their packages: "Supportive but not conclusive research shows that eating 1.5 ounces per day of walnuts, as part of a low saturated fat and low cholesterol diet and not resulting in increased caloric intake, may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease. See nutrition information for fat [and calorie] content."
The FDA website goes on to explain that the bracketed phrase "and calorie" is optional, in that the FDA considered it "might be beneficial to consumers to heighten their awareness of the caloric contribution from walnuts and encourages companies to include it in product labeling."
In other words, the FDA seems to say, please don’t try to hide the fact that walnuts are high in calories.
Food and supplement companies have petitioned for a variety of health claims, which make risk-reducing connections between soy protein and cancer, calcium and kidney stones, green tea and cancer, chromium picolinate and diabetes, and omega-3 fatty acids and coronary heart disease. Kraft Foods Inc. points out in a petition that its "interest in the regulation of claims on food labels is substantial," as it seeks to obtain an omega-3 health claim for its spreads and dressings.
The FDA says that its goal in allowing qualified claims is less about getting consumers to feel comfortable about indulging in mayonnaise and more about making nutritional science more accessible by putting it right on packaging. The H.J. Heinz Co., as part of a group petition for a claim that touts the lycopene in tomato products as reducing the risk of prostate cancer, estimated that if people increased their consumption of spaghetti sauce by one cup per week, it would prevent 10,000 new cases of prostate cancer.
The distraction, researchers say, carries genuine risk. "It may be true that if you eat dairy products, you decrease the risk of osteoporosis. What is missing is the educational piece saying if you add dairy products, you need to take something else out of your diet, so that you don’t increase your caloric intake," said Alice H. Lichtenstein, Stanley N. Gershoff Professor at the Friedman School and director of the Cardiovascular Nutrition Laboratory at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging. "Now, with obesity hitting epidemic proportions, it becomes a critical part of that message."
The plain truth, researchers say, is that a balanced diet and a regular exercise routine constitute the only path to Rome, and though it might cross through olive oil, oats and the occasional walnut, there are no shortcuts.
(source : www.nutrition.tufts.edu)
