© CRISTÓBAL CASTRO (EL PAÍS) One of the factors that contribute to its consumption is the wide range of fast food.The Journal of the American Heart Association recently published an article evaluating the benefits of following the World Health Organization's salt intake recommendations. In Australia alone, where the study was conducted, a 30% reduction in sodium intake over the next two years could prevent 1,700 premature deaths and 7,000 new diagnoses of heart disease, kidney and stomach cancer each year.
Another 2021 analysis, published in the scientific journal Circulation , estimates that meeting the US National Salt and Sugar Initiative targets of reducing consumption of packaged foods by 20% and reducing sugary beverages by 40% prescribes, can cause about 490,000 heart diseases. Diseases. deaths - blood vessel disease, as well as 750,000 new cases of diabetes over several decades.
The benefits of significantly reducing sugar, salt, fat, and processed foods can lead to positive social change. Smart public policy is essential. For example, public awareness campaigns – such as those promoting seat belts in cars to drastically reduce accidents – are very effective. If the negative effects of poor nutrition are clear, then can't nutrition be promoted by getting people to eat healthily?
Manuel Franco, a professor of epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University, explains how he thinks significant reductions in salt and sugar intake can occur: "[These habits] have to be created in a social setting so that I don't make the decision must . between eating with a lot of salt and eating with a pinch of salt every time I eat. It won't work that way. People, especially those with fewer resources, have less time to prepare meals and choose healthy options. We need politicians who have already made a decision."
Franco and other scholars have examined the dramatic historical experiences that led to such decisions. For example, after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States tightened the embargo on Cuba, which depended heavily on Soviet support. This combination of misfortunes caused a severe economic crisis on the island known as the "special period".
Cubans went from 3,000 calories a day to about 2,200 calories a day while a lack of fuel forced them to walk or bike everywhere. In a study published in the British Medical Journal , Franco showed that making a drastic lifestyle change, which islanders remembered as an unhappy time, was beneficial to their health.
The combination of diet and exercise resulted in a widespread loss of 10 pounds per person across the country, improving several key health indicators. An analysis of the health of Cubans between 1980 and 2010 found that such weight loss helped reduce deaths from diabetes by half and deaths from coronary artery disease by a third. It also reduces the number of hits.
Despite the positive results of this unintended experiment, no society is likely to support a government that subjects its population to a quota system despite improved health. Furthermore, according to nutritionist Juan Revenga, “there is a very strong industry around [junk food] that is bad for our health. Many jobs depend on it. It exists because the products are bought, and they are bought because we like them."
In recent years, due to increased societal and political awareness of the effects of diet on health, certain measures have been taken to reduce the consumption of salt and sugar, which combined with fat make them attractive as processed foods. In Spain, the Soft Drinks Association (ANFABRA) has committed to reducing the total sugar content of its products by 53% between 2020 and 2025.
Last year, the Spanish government introduced a limit on the amount of salt allowed in bread. It is estimated that this measure alone reduces the average salt consumption of Spaniards - around nine grams per day - by about 20%. But even with this reduction, your remaining intake will still be higher than the 2-5 grams of salt per day recommended by the World Health Organization.
In order to reduce sugar consumption, the Spanish government increased the sales tax on sugar and sweet drinks from 10% to 21% in 2021. A policy analysis by the Barcelona-based business school ESADE's Center for Economic Policy found that while the tax increase had no impact on beverage consumption in middle- and high-income households, it reduced consumption of sugary beverages by 13% or 11%. liters per household - among the poorest third of Spaniards. It also led to a 10.5% drop in consumption of high-sugar snacks among the low-income population.
The value of sales taxes in behavior change has also been shown to be beneficial for harmful non-food products such as tobacco. In Colombia, doubling the price of a pack of cigarettes reduced total consumption by 34%.
ANFABRA chief executive Beatrice Plasca Marzal believes the self-regulation "has shown that progress can be made" without limiting the change to "piecemeal measures" that include soda taxes. She assures EL PAÍS that professionals in her sector - which accounts for 2.1% of the total calorie consumption of Spaniards - "will strive to reduce sugar consumption".
She points out that drinks with little or no sugar already account for 60% of drinks production in Spain. In addition, he mentions other measures the industry has taken, partly in recognition of the belief that many products sold are not entirely safe. "We are committed not to promoting our products to children under the age of 13 ... and to selling no soft drinks in primary schools and only low-calorie or no-calorie drinks in secondary schools."
Ramón Ortega, professor of bioethics at the University of Niebrich in Madrid, discovered other ways to adjust the behavior of groups of people around food without restricting their freedom. “Fatherhood is very present in our lives. One of the cases is the seat belt, forcing us [the authorities] to use it for our own good without allowing freedom of choice...or using certain means, like the heroine, forbid."
Ortega's concept of "libertarian paternalism" would lie somewhere in the middle of this policy. This may involve using population bias to make people more likely to make healthy choices without being directly coerced into making them.
“An example of this is what was done in canteens at Google headquarters. To reduce soft drink consumption, they put vending machines in places that are less visible than water dispensers,” says Ortega. "Thanks to this move, Google has increased its water consumption by 47% [among its employees]."
Other examples of these positive uses, described by Ortega—who recently wrote an article on the subject in The Conversation —are serving meat, fish, and salad in school canteens while students can buy fries. Or, as has happened in some cities in Argentina, restaurants have had to remove salt shakers from tables. If customers want extra salt, they have to ask for it.
Ortega concedes that this policy "involves a degree of manipulation without seeking rational action". However, he sees it as a positive alternative to more restrictive health measures. He also points out that the food industry also uses these cognitive biases to guide our behavior, “for example, when staple foods — including meat or fish — are placed at the back of the supermarket to force us to walk past other products, like sweets or potatoes. Crisps."
When it comes to the question of the ability to ward off the temptation (in the form of junk food) of citizens, the appeal is often made to freedom of choice: consumers and companies can choose what they buy and produce. However, this freedom is already conditional. The high amounts of sugar, salt, and fat in processed foods often result in combinations not found in nature that have profound effects on our brains. For this reason, water, for example, is considered bland compared to sugary drinks.
Some researchers, such as Ashley Gerhardt from the University of Michigan and Johannes Heybrand from the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany, have analyzed the addictive potential of certain foods.
Gerhardt points out that certain foods - such as pizza, fries or hamburgers - share certain properties with addictive substances. So we find it difficult to control our consumption, even though we know that it is not good for us. Many products are designed to provide a more intense sensation of pleasure...much like what happens with coca leaves when they are converted into cocaine.
On the other hand, Hebrand, who disagrees with the term "eating addiction", believes that the overconsumption of certain foods is mainly due to their appearance in places like supermarkets, as well as their high variety that interests consumers. .
Johns Hopkins' Dr. Franco believes a return to less processed foods with less salt and sugar will make a big difference for today's consumers.
“We will not all be flexible at once, nor will we enjoy bread without salt. We will not be able to shop and cook three hours a day because that would require drastic changes in the economy and society.”
Also, the food industry “is not only very powerful, it also feeds us,” notes Franco. “We can live without tobacco... but not without the food industry. We must live together by promoting change.”
Revenga - which questions the value of measures like reducing salt in processed foods "because they can give the impression that it's safe to eat a product that's still not healthy" - believes an important one A step forward is that they “start learning in schools what our mothers are so good at: buying food and cooking, nobody can do that anymore.
Subscribe to our weekly newsletter for more English news from EL PAÍS USA Edition