NYC Considers War On Bad Fat

(CBS/AP)  Three years after New York City banned smoking in restaurants, city health officials are talking about a new rule for its 24,600 food service establishments: dramatic restrictions on the use of artificial trans fatty acids.

New York's Board of Health Tuesday unveiled a proposal that would sharply limit the use of ingredients that contain the artery-clogging substance, commonly listed on food labels as partially hydrogenated oil.

If the ban goes into effect, offending restaurants could face a $2,000 fine for serving chips, cakes or cookies with too much trans fat, reports CBS News correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi.

The New York Times says the city's Board of Health – which has the authority to impose the restrictions without the consent of any other agency – voted unanimously in favor of the plan to limit artificial trans fats to half a gram per serving. The paper says the rule is subject to a public comment period, a public hearing set for Oct. 30th, and a final vote in December.

A similar plan to restrict trans fats in restaurant food has been proposed in Chicago and is still under consideration, although it has been ridiculed by some as unnecessary government meddling.

The latest version of the Chicago plan would only apply to companies with annual revenues of more than $20 million, a provision aimed exclusively at fast-food giants.

Artificial trans fats are found in some shortenings, margarine and frying oils and turn up in foods from pie crusts to french fries to doughnuts.

Doctors agree that trans fats are unhealthy in nearly any amount, but a spokesman for the restaurant industry said he was stunned the city would seek to ban a legal ingredient found in millions of American kitchens.

"Labeling is one thing, but when they totally ban a product, it goes well beyond what we think is prudent and acceptable," said Chuck Hunt, executive vice president of the city's chapter of the New York State Restaurant Association.

He said the proposal could create havoc: Cooks would be forced to discard old recipes and scrutinize every ingredient in their pantry. A restaurant could face a fine if an inspector finds the wrong type of vegetable shortening on its shelves.

The proposal also would create a huge problem for national chains. Among the fast foods that would need to get an overhaul or face a ban: McDonald's french fries, Kentucky Fried Chicken and several varieties of Dunkin' Donuts.

Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden acknowledged that the ban would be a challenge for restaurants, but he said trans fats can easily be replaced with substitute oils that taste the same or better and are far less unhealthy.

"It is a dangerous and unnecessary ingredient," Frieden said. "No one will miss it when it's gone."

A few companies have moved to eliminate trans fats on their own.

Wendy's announced in August that it had switched to a new cooking oil that contains no trans fatty acids. Crisco now sells a shortening that contains zero trans fats. Frito-Lay removed trans fats from its Doritos and Cheetos. Kraft's took trans fats out of Oreos.

McDonald's began using a trans fat-free cooking oil in Denmark after that country banned artificial trans fats in processed food, but it has yet to do so in the United States.

Walt Riker, vice president of corporate communications at McDonald's, said in a statement Tuesday that the company would review New York's proposal.

"McDonald's knows this is an important issue, which is why we continue to test in earnest to find ways to further reduce (trans fatty acid) levels," he said.

New York's health department had asked restaurants to impose a voluntary ban last year but found use of trans fats unchanged in recent surveys.

Under the New York proposal, restaurants would need to get artificial trans fats out of cooking oils, margarine and shortening by July 1, 2007, and all other foodstuffs by July 1, 2008. It would not affect grocery stores. It also would not apply to naturally occurring trans fats, which are found in some meats and dairy.

The Board of Health has yet to approve the proposal and will not do so until at least December, Frieden said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration began requiring food labels to list trans fats in January.

Dr. Walter Willett, chairman of the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard University School of Public Health, praised New York health officials for considering a ban, which he said could save lives.

"Artificial trans fats are very toxic, and they almost surely cause tens of thousands of premature deaths each year," he said. "The federal government should have done this long ago."

[aristotle11]

Fair enough, Jaspers. But this is why I call trans fat poison.

According to a Harvard Study in the NEJM, trans fats cause 100,000 excess heart disease deaths in the US each year.
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/reviews/transfats.html

According to a Wake Forest Study, monkeys who ate trans fats were 30% fatter than monkeys who ate the same diet (same grams of fat, number of calories, etc.) with normal oil. The trans fat monkeys also developed diabetes. Other studies have shown that trans fats increase the bad LDL cholesterol while decreasing the good HDL cholesterol, and that the combined effect on the ratio of LDL to HDL cholesterol is double that of saturated fats.
http://www1.wfubmc.edu/News/NewsARticle.htm?ArticleID=1869

The journal Nature reported preliminary evidence of trans fat%u2019s causing brain damage (damage that does not occur with an equivalent diet of 12% normal oil).
http://www.bioedonline.org/news/news.cfm?art=1320

Sounds like poison to me.

[jasperrdm]

Ok you got me on the low cost. but the Jungle was published a century ago. I havenot read any thing from the Jungle since high school if not before.
The avg consumer is better educated and has more power today.
You make the choice to eat out. I got tired of some steak places near me using a mariande which contains MSG. Even though I ask what was in the mariande some wait staff did not know etc. So me and my wife quit dining in those places. Thankfully I only senstive to MSG. If I had been allegric I would have in hostipal a couple of times.
I bring my own lunch and rare eat out any more due menu choices.
And please you hurt your arguement when you call it poison. How about not good for you. Less heated and more accurate.

[aristotle11]

Jaspers, you are incorrect on 2 points.

1. LOW COST TO SWITCH: Your olive analogy (American Airlines removing one olive from each salad saving $75k a year) supports my position much better than your own. Using normal, healthy oil would cost each restaurant a few bucks. If one corporation owned all NYC restaurants, then switching from trans fat to normal oil would add up to millions for that one company. But the restaurants are owned by many different people, and so the cost is really a few bucks for each owner. The cost of switching is diluted among the many owners, and so it wouldn't be an excessive burden to any one of them. The better "olive analogy" is this: each person (i.e, the restaurants) must pay for an extra olive (i.e., the switch to healthy oil), and each olive costs each person very little.

2. MORE CHOICES: Less than 1 in 1000 NYC restaurants offer trans fat free fried food. I've asked around, and I cannot find any reasonably priced place in mid town Manhattan that offers it. If I want to buy fried food in mid town, I must eat trans fat. I don't have the choices I should have.

Why fry in poison when it costs and tastes the same to use normal oil? The gov't can't outlaw all unhealthy foods, though, since there is a great benefit to many unhealthy foods: they taste better!

PS- Read Upton Sinclair's *The Jungle* for why we can't trust the free market to solve all public health problems with the food industry.

[jasperrdm]

Jasper stands up from the Group W bench. My dear Aristotle11 your last statement is in error. ...So really the restaurants are not giving us the (healthy) *choice* we should have, since they want to save some (very small) amount of money.....
You as consumer and customer of the restaurants can ask for healthy choices on the menu. Or ask the owner to change his oils. Or eat at home and take you own meals with you.
The small amount of money comment means you have forgotten the power of small numbers with large repeating frequency. Aka the worn out trivia of American Airlines removing one olive from its salads saving $75k a year. Or Mr Bo Jangles nickle and quarter dances.
Jasper sits down on the Group W bench. And wonders why he still posting here.

[aristotle11]

The big issue is "cost vs. benefit of switching to normal oil": same taste, (nearly) same cost. There is no benefit to trans fats.

The common, misguided objection is "We can't just force health foods on people." The reply is that there is some benefit to having some unhealthy fried foods, since replacing them with steamed foods is not nearly as tasty or fun. But trans fats don't make the fired food taste any different.

Imagine (hypothetically) there were cigarettes that tasted the same and cost the same but had far less harmful health effects as current cigarettes on the market. Why smoke the unhealthy cigarettes when there is a healthy alternative that tastes and costs the same? The only reason to smoke the unhealthy cigarettes is if the healthy ones were not available. Moreover, in this hypothetical, the gov%u2019t should force the cigarette companies to make the healthy cigarettes available.

The analogy is that the NYC restaurants do not make the healthy alternative available, and **no one** would eat the trans fat alternative if they had a choice (the McD%u2019s fries taste the same, go to Denmark and see). So really the restaurants are not giving us the (healthy) *choice* we should have, since they want to save some (very small) amount of money.

[jasperrdm]

Psss anyone what to help ship special cooking oil to New York City. Only a Benjy for a pint.
We can't keep drugs out people bodies.
hmmm
I sitting here on the Group W. I said I here on the Group W bench. With father killers, mother killers, granny muggers, all of sitting on the Group W bench. And the meanest, badest, ugliest father mother mugger killer of them all sits right down beside me on the Group W Bench. He whispers "Psst kid. What are here for?"
And I sitting on the Group W bench look him the meanest badest uglies father mothr mugger killer of the all straight in the eye and said
"I ate two Big Macs in New York City"

and they all moved away from me on the Group W bench.

[heartsong867]

Hey, remember Prohibition? A Constitutional amendment, no less! I can see it now...people traveling outside NYC to get their trans fats, clandestine eateries disguising what's in a can or bottle, BYO trans fats restaurants, where patrons bring their fat of choice for the chef to prepare a meal.

Then, let's make possession of trans fats inside the city limits a misdemeanor. Of course, the city will need 'fat' police to issue a summons. That will clog the courts just like trans fats....ah, poetic justice.

The governments have become 'caregivers'/'caretakers'. Since FDR, they have taken on responsibilities that used to be left to individuals and communities, creating a nation of dependent people, instead of independent ones. "Let us legislate, make laws and give us enough money and we can fix it!" Therein lies the problem... That was not the purpose of government, and now we have a mess... Life is about making choices..and it has been oft told, we reap what we sow.

[rudy654-2009]

Trans fat is good oil that was turned into something bad (partially hydrogenated fat) in order to sell taste and make the shelf life of food last longer. The selling of poison to an unsuspecting public has been all about money. How many people past and present have had to pay the price for this kind of corporate greed? I can't believe anyone could defend it.

[cantshutup]

fallngempire got it right...all those in favor of having someone else think for you? WRONG!!!

[fastdady]

Wordlord, your point on scientists informing us is correct. However after they inform us it is still OUR CHOICE! What part of that do you not understand. first of all i have a real serious problem with health depts none of which are ELECTED officials making rules and laws that can get people fined. They have NO business doing that period and its time that people stood up and let them know. What next? they goin to be in my home telling me what I can and cant eat! It will be a cold day you know where before that happens you can be sure of that.