key points
- San Francisco is suing companies including Kellogg, Nestle and Coca-Cola
- City claims companies’ ultraprocessed foods have created public health crisis
- Trade group says there is no unanimous definition of ultraprocessed foods
San Francisco is suing makers of ultraprocessed foods, including Kraft Heinz, Coca-Cola, Nestle, Kellogg and Mondelez.
San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu said, “These companies created a public health crisis with their engineering and marketing of ultraprocessed foods.”
“They took food and made it unfamiliar and harmful to the human body.”
What we know about the San Francisco lawsuit
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in San Francisco Superior Court, accuses 10 corporations of violating California laws on public nuisance and deceptive marketing.
It alleges that manufacturers promoted products they knew were harmful for marketing purposes and ignored or obscured the risks – similar to how tobacco companies operate.
“Like Big Tobacco, the ultraprocessed food industry targets children to increase its profits,” it said in a statement.
The lawsuit claims that as ultraprocessed foods have proliferated, rates of obesity, cancer, and diabetes have increased.
The city is seeking damages and civil penalties to cover its health care costs.
It also wants a court order barring the companies from engaging in deceptive marketing and requiring them to change their practices.
It is the first time a US municipality has sued over claims that food companies knowingly marketed addictive and harmful ultraprocessed foods.
What are ultraprocessed foods?
There is no agreed definition of ultraprocessed food.
But researchers generally apply the term to foods mass-produced using industrial processing techniques and chemically modified substances that cannot typically be produced in a typical home kitchen.
Typical ultraprocessed foods include commercially produced bread, frozen pizza, hot dogs, candy, soft drinks, chips, sugary breakfast cereals, and instant soups.
They often contain many additional ingredients such as fat, sugars or sweeteners, salt and artificial colors or preservatives.
They probably also contain other industrially produced substances such as thickeners, foaming agents and emulsifiers.
About 70% of products sold in American supermarkets are ultraprocessed, and children in the United States get about 60% of their calories from such foods.
“Americans want to avoid ultraprocessed foods, but we are surrounded by them. These companies created a public health crisis, they made handsome profits, and now they need to take responsibility for the harm they’ve caused,” Chiu said.
What are the health issues associated with ultraprocessed food?
Three-part series published in prestigious medical journals The Lancet In November, ultraprocessed foods were blamed for the rise in many diseases from obesity to cancer.
Other studies link consumption of more ultraprocessed foods to a higher risk of early death or cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease, and cerebrovascular disease.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control, 40% of Americans are obese.
About 16% have diabetes, a condition that can be caused by being extremely overweight.
How has the food industry responded to the San Francisco lawsuit?
“There is currently no consensus on the scientific definition of ultraprocessed foods,” said Sarah Gallo of the Consumer Brands Association, a trade group representing several companies targeted in the lawsuit.
“Attempting to classify foods as unhealthy simply because they are processed, or demonizing a food by ignoring its full nutrient content, misleads consumers and increases health disparities,” he said in a statement.
Edited by: Zack Crellin
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