Search results: Cereal

A reader, William Haaf, alerted me to this one: California companies required to disclose heavy metal content in baby food

As of January 2025, baby food manufacturers selling in California must disclose test results for four heavy metals – arsenic, lead, cadmium, and mercury – via an on-pack QR code.

The law, Assembly Bill 899 (AB 899), was signed by Governor Gavin Newsom in October 2023 and requires monthly testing of baby food for the specified contaminants.

Manufacturers must now provide a QR code on product packaging that links to publicly available test results, including batch numbers and links to the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) information on toxic heavy metals.

What this is about

• The decision follows a 2021 US Congressional report that found significantly high levels of heavy metals in major baby food brands, including arsenic levels up to 91 times the legal limit for drinking water and lead levels up to 177 times higher.
• Maryland will require baby food testing disclosures from January 2026
• Virginia introduced House Bill 1844 to mandate heavy metal transparency starting in January 2026
• The FDA  just finalized voluntary action levels for lead in children’s food
• This is part of the FDA’s Closer to Zero: Reducing Childhood Exposure to Contaminants from Foods 
• What the American Academy of Pediatrics says about toxic metals

How to avoid toxic metals in baby foods: Suggestions

• Offer a variety of healthy vegetables and fruits
• Make your own baby food
• Limit highly processed foods
• Limit rice cereal
• Offer other cereals and whole grains
• If you must give fruit juice, make your own
• Limit processed snacks
• Don’t use teething biscuits.
• Test your tap water

Here’s what the FDA says about Use of the Term Healthy on Food Labeling.

To meet the updated criteria for the claim, a food product needs to

1. contain a certain amount of food from at least one of the food groups or subgroups (such as fruit, vegetables, grains, fat-free and low-fat dairy and protein foods) recommended by the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, and
2. meet specific limits for added sugars, saturated fat and sodium.

To qualify, a breakfast cereal, bread, or any other grain food would need to have 3/4 ounce of whole grains, and have less than 10% of the Daily Value for added sugars (5 grams per serving), less than 10% for sodium (230 mg per serving), and less that 1 gram of saturated fat (5% DV).

On this basis, kids cereals won’t qualify.

Oh.  And the FDA is still working on the symbol.

Resources

• Use of the Term Healthy on Food Labeling | FDA
• FDA Finalizes Updated “Healthy” Nutrient Content Claim | FDA
• Constituent update
• FDA’s Updated “Healthy” Claim Definition: Fact Sheet
• Federal Register: https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2024-29957.pdf
• New York Times: What Are ‘Healthy’ Foods? The F.D.A. Updates the Labeling Terms
• The Hill: FDA updates definition of ‘healthy’ on food labels for first time in 30 years

While we are on the topic of marketing to kids, Healthy Eating Research has published a major report on digital food marketing: Evidence-Based Recommendations to Mitigate Harms from Digital Food Marketing to Children Ages 2-17.  

Despite its importance, the report is dense, detailed, and not easy to summarize.  Fortunately, I received an email with Key Messages

• An expert panel convened by Healthy Eating Research reviewed research and current policies on digital food marketing and developed recommendations for government policies, industry practices, and further research.
• Digital food and beverage marketing is embedded in nearly every platform children and adolescents use (websites, mobile apps, social media, video sharing, gaming, streaming TV), promoting sugary drinks, fast food, candy, sugary cereals, and sweet/salty snacks, which is harming children’s health.
• National experts carefully assessed the evidence and found actions policymakers and industry can take to reduce children’s exposure to and the power of unhealthy digital food and beverage marketing.

My recommendation: start with the Fact Sheet for Parents.

The most common types of foods marketed to kids online are fast food, salty snacks, candy, sweet snacks, and sugary drinks. These ads appear on social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat; video sharing sites like YouTube and TikTok; gaming platforms like Roblox and Minecraft; livestream gaming on Twitch and Facebook Gaming; and mobile apps and websites. Younger kids see more ads for candy and sweet snacks, while older kids and teenagers see more ads for snack foods. About 75% of kids have seen ads for energy drinks.

That’s what parents are up against.  As for what to do about it, short of throwing away the phone, the report urges advocacy for phone-free schools and other policies at Fair Play for Kids  and Design It For Us.

It’t tough being a parent these days.  Join those groups and take action!

Resources

• Technical Report
• Executive Summary
• Fact Sheet for Parents

I spent a lot of time last week responding to reporters’ questions about Trump’s appointing Robert F. Kennedy, Jr to head the Department of Health and Human Services.

Here’s what the president-elect said about the appointment on Twitter (X):

For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to Public Health…HHS will play a big role in helping ensure that everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals, pollutants, pesticides, pharmaceutical products, and food additives that have contributed to the overwhelming Health Crisis in this Country. Mr. Kennedy will restore these Agencies to the traditions of Gold Standard Scientific Research, and beacons of Transparency, to end the Chronic Disease epidemic, and to Make America Great and Healthy Again!

Trump has instructed Mr. Kennedy to end chronic disease and “Go wild on food.”

In various statements, Mr. Kennedy has said he wants to get rid of “poisons”

• Ultra-processed foods in schools
• Artificial colors in cereals
• Chemicals, pollutants, pesticides
• Mercury in fish
• Fast food

He also wants to

• Restrict sodas on SNAP
• Promote sustainable, regenerative farming by small farmers
• End conflicts of interest between government agencies and corporations: Corporate capture is the biggest threat to democracy.

These are the kinds of things I’ve been saying and writing about for decades!

[He also is pushing for some things that are much less well grounded in science: getting rid of grains for kids, seed oils, and fluoride in drinking water; deregulating raw milk; and firing all nutrition scientists on day 1].

If he really does do what he’s promising here, it means taking on the food industry, in a way that no government has ever done, and Trump showed no signs of doing in his first term.

What can we expect?  I have no idea, but thist sure will be interesting to watch.

Mother Jones calls Kennedy’s appointment “a genuine catastrophe.”

For charges of hypocrisy, click here.

Civil Eats asked a bunch of people to predict “The Path Forward for Food and Ag.”  Here’s what I said.

I wish I had a crystal ball to say how food and agriculture issues would play out over the next four years, but all I have to go on is what Trump and his followers say. If we take them at their word, then we must expect them to implement their Project 2025 plan, which replaces one deep state with another that favors conservative business interests and ideology. This calls for replacing staff in federal agencies with Trump loyalists and dismantling them, stopping the USDA from doing anything to prevent climate change, reforming farm subsidies (unclear how), splitting the farm bill to deal separately with agricultural supports and SNAP, reducing SNAP participation by reinstating work requirements and reducing the Thrifty Food Plan, and making it more difficult for kids to participate in school meals.

On the other hand, some of the plans make sense: eliminating checkoff programs and repealing the sugar program, for example. So do some of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s goals: Make America Healthy Again by focusing on chronic disease prevention, getting harmful chemicals out of kids’ foods, and getting rid of conflicts of interest among researchers and agency staff. It’s too early to know how much of this is just talk, but I’m planning to do what I can to oppose measures I view as harmful, but to strongly support the ones I think will be good for public health.

Last week, the USDA issued new rules for the nutrient content of school meals and also child care programs.

These apply to sugar and sodium (nutrients), whole grains (ingredient or food),  and milk (food).

The New York Times report on this cut right to the chase

The Agriculture Department announced on Wednesday that it had finalized the regulation it had first proposed in February 2023, having weakened several provisions after feedback from food companies, school nutrition professionals and over 136,000 public comments.

The Update to the standards describes the changes and compares them to USDA’s original proposals.

• Sugars: For the first time (I’m not kidding), the USDA set limits on sugars, starting with breakfast cereals (6 grams per ounce), yogurt (12 grams per 6-ounce serving), and milk (10 grams per 8-ounce serving).  This allows chocolate and other flavored milks if companies get the sugar down to 10 grams.
• Sodium: beginning July 2027, sodium will be reduced by 15% for lunch and 10% for breakfast from current limits (USDA proposed 3 consecutive reductions of 10% over the next five years.
• Whole grains: no change from current standard (USDA proposed that 80% of grains be whole).
• Milk: Allows flavored fat-free and low-fat.

Comment: The sugar rule is an improvement, even though products still are sweetened.  The weakening of the sodium proposal is troubling.  We badly need to reduce sodium in processed and restaurant foods and need federal leadership for doing so.  USDA caved to political pressure here.  The USDA has a long history of captivity by Big Ag.  Now it looks captured by Big Food.

The food industry complaint is that its products won’t meet these standards.  The school food complaint is that the standards are too hard to meet, the kids won’t eat the food, and it will be wasted.

I have a lot of sympathy for school foodservice.  It’s the only thing going on in schools that has to be self-supporting, and school food programs are hugely underfunded.  And lots of schools don’t have kitchens to must rely on food products rather than real food.

But from what I’ve observed, two kinds of skills are needed for successful school meal programs: the ability (1) to prepare and serve edible healthy food, and (2) to get the kids to eat it.  I’ve seen every permutation.

1. Good food, kids eat it
2. Good food, kids won’t eat it
3. So-so food, kids eat it
4. So-so food, kids won’t eat it

Whenever I hear “the kids won’t eat it,” I wonder where the adults are. From what I’ve seen, if adults care that kids are fed, the kids will eat the food—not all, necessarily, but most.

School food is not just about the food.  It’s about the interactions of school food personnel, teachers, and the principal with the kids.  If the adults think it important and necessary to feed kids healthy food, the program has a good chance of success.  The new USDA standards are a step in the right direction but still have a way to go.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we had food standards rather than nutrition standards?  How about mandating numbers of servings of real foods instead of worrying about grams of sugar and milligrams of sodium.

A thought,

Additional Resources

• Comparison Chart: 2023 Proposed Standards vs. 2024 Final Standards
• Implementation Timeline – School Meals
• Implementation Timeline – CACFP & SFSP
• Media Toolkit
  • Infographic: Final Rule for School Meal Standards
  • Infographic: Implementation Timeline
  • Infographic: How We Got Here
  • Video: Rule Overview
  • Video: Added Sugars
• Federal Register notice 

An investigative report from Public Eye and the International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN): “How Nestlé gets children hooked on sugar in lower-income countries.”

Nestlé’s leading baby-food brands, promoted in low- and middle-income countries as healthy and key to supporting young children’s development, contain high levels of added sugar. In Switzerland, where Nestlé is headquartered, such products are sold with no added sugar. These are the main findings of a new investigation by Public Eye and the International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN), which shed light on Nestlé’s hypocrisy and the deceptive marketing strategies deployed by the Swiss food giant.

The report points out that Nestlé (no relation) “currently controls 20 percent of the baby-food market, valued at nearly $70 billion.”

Nestlé promotes Cerelac and Nido as brands whose aim is to help children “live healthier lives”. Fortified with vitamins, minerals and other micronutrients, these products are, according to the multinational, tailored to the needs of babies and young children and help to strengthen their growth, immune system and cognitive development….

Spoiler alert: Our investigation shows that, for Nestlé, not all babies are equal when it comes to added sugar. While in Switzerland, where the company is headquartered, the main infant cereals and formula brands sold by the multinational come without added sugar, most Cerelac and Nido products marketed in lower-income countries do contain added sugar, often at high levels.

For example, in Switzerland, Nestlé promotes its biscuit-flavoured cereals for babies aged from six months with the claim “no added sugar”, while in Senegal and South Africa, Cerelac cereals with the same flavour contain 6 grams of added sugar per serving….

Similarly, in Germany, France and the UK – Nestlé’s main European markets – all formulas for young children aged 12-36 months sold by the company contain no added sugar. And while some infant cereals for young children over one year old contain added sugar, cereals for babies aged six months do not.

Do small amounts of sugar like these make any difference to babies’ health?  After all, 6 gram is just a bit more than a teaspoon.

They might make a big difference:

• They get kids hooked on sugars.
• The sugars can add up quickly.

For sure, this report shows is that sugar is not really necessary.  It is there to encourage sales, not health.

The report is getting international publicity:

• The Guardian: Nestlé adds sugar to infant milk sold in poorer countries, report finds
• DE: https://stories.publiceye.ch/nestle-babyfood
• FR: https://stories.publiceye.ch/nestle-bebes
• SP: https://stories.publiceye.ch/nestle-ninos
• PO: https://stories.publiceye.ch/nestle-criancas

Thanks to everyone who flooded my mailbox with this piece from The Guardian: She was fired after not endorsing Splenda-filled salads to people with diabetes. Why?

According to a lawsuit {Elizabeth] Hanna recently filed against the ADA, the organization – which endorses recipes and food plans on its websiteand on the websites of “partner” food brands – tried to get her to greenlight recipes that she believedflew in the face of the ADA’s mission. These included recipes like a “cucumber and onion salad” made with a third of a cup of Splenda granulated artificial sweetener, “autumnal sheet-pan veggies” with a quarter cup of Splenda monk fruit sweetener and a “cranberry almond spinach salad” with a quarter cup of Splenda monkfruit sweetener.

Guess which company gave more than $1m to the ADA in 2022? Splenda.

I also was sent an email from Georgia Warren, the  Guardian’s Interim membership editor: The link between investigative reporting, some nightmarish recipes and the diabetes epidemic.

Why would a public health charity promote a product that its own science shows contributes to the disease it is fighting? Well, as Neil Barsky reported for us this week, the ADA took more than $1m from Splenda in 2022 – and then fired their chief nutritionist when, according to a lawsuit she recently filed, she refused to sign-off on the Splenda-based recipes that her bosses wanted the ADA to publicly endorse.

Neil – creator of our new series ‘Death by diabetes: America’s preventable epidemic’ – told me…“The ADA has bought into a system that requires them to raise money from corporations to fund their research. I don’t for a second doubt that every single person who works there cares about people with diabetes and wants to do the right thing, but being beholden to these groups distorts your judgment.”

..And what else is pharma funding? The ADA. The organization – whose guidance doctors rely on when treating their diabetes patients – boasts a $100m annual budget. Between 2017 and 2024, pharmaceutical and device manufacturers contributed over $134m to the organization – or roughly 20% of its total funding.

Comment: The ADA has long appeared to be in thrall the the drug industry.  I well remember the talk I gave at one of its annual conventions years ago.  I was one of two speakers about diet and diabetes (the other was a session on the role of sugar in diabetes sponsored by Coca-Cola—truly you can’t make this stuff up).  The other talks, hundreds of them, were about drugs.  At that time, the ADA said virtually nothing about diet on its website.

It’s gotten much better.  Here’s what it says about carbohydrates:

• Try to eat less of these: refined, highly processed carbohydrate foods and those with added sugar. These include sugary drinks like soda, sweet tea and juice, refined grains like white bread, white rice and sugary cereal, and sweets and snack foods like cake, cookies, candy and chips.

And here’s what the ADA says about artificial sweeteners:

It’s also important to know that at this time, there is no clear evidence to suggest that using sugar substitutes will help with managing blood sugar or weight or improving cardiometabolic health in the long run. So here’s the bottom line:

• Sugar substitutes are effective alternatives to sugar for some people, but not a perfect fit for all—it’s a personal choice.
• If you’re looking to reduce your intake of sugar or sugar substitutes, start slowly. For example, start by replacing one soda or juice with water or a no-calorie drink at a time.
• Water will always be a great choice! If you start feeling yourself get bored with just water, you can always spruce it up with fruits or herbs like this sparkling strawberry mint infused water.

And, finally for now, here are the ADA’s corporate sponsors, and its national sponsors.

Conflicted?  Sure looks like it.

The USDA has made some changes to food packages for participants in the Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC).

In a Q and A, the USDA explains the changes and why it made them.

What are the WIC food packages?

The WIC food packages provide supplemental foods designed to address the specific nutritional needs of income-eligible pregnant, breastfeeding, and non-breastfeeding postpartum individuals, infants, and children up to five years of age who are at nutritional risk.

WIC participants receive a monthly benefit from one of seven science-based food packages, according to their life stage nutritional needs. Participants then use their WIC electronic benefit transfer (EBT) card to buy the food and beverages in their package.

If you want to know what’s actually in the package, it’s a lot easier to go to state sites; the USDA site does not help much.

Try New York State’s WIC site. Women with children can use their EBT benefits to buy these foods (women with infants can also get formula and baby food):

• Low fat (1%) or nonfat (skim) milk for women and children two years of age or older
• Whole milk for children one to two years of age
• Cheese, yogurt, evaporated milk, evaporated goat’s milk, or dry milk as milk substitutions
• Soy beverage and tofu as milk alternatives
• Dry beans, canned beans or peanut butter options
• Whole wheat bread or other whole grain options (whole wheat tortillas, brown rice, whole wheat pasta) for children and pregnant and mostly or fully breastfeeding women
• Cash value benefit for fresh, frozen or canned vegetables and fruits
  • Women receive $11.00-$16.50 depending on breastfeeding status
  • Children receive $9.00
• Eggs
• Whole grain cereals
• 100% unsweetened fruit juice
• Canned fish for fully breastfeeding women

Going back to the USDA site. I looked at the changes, lots of them excellent. 

One is expanded benefits in general, and for fruits and vegetables in particular.

Another is improved benefits for women who are breastfeeding.

But for Breakfast Cereals, here’s what the USDA proposed.And here’s what it got, post lobbying.

The bottom line: less whole grain, and more sugar.

Does this make any difference?

In principle, yes. The USDA should not make decisions based on the food companies’ demands to make their products qualify more easily for WIC purchases.

It would be good to keep as much ultra-processed junk food as possible out of the WIC package.

These cave-ins are unlikely to make any noticable difference to health, but set a bad precedent.

Here’s what happened with the rest of the package, mostly to the good.

• Fruits and Vegetables
• Juice
• Milk and Milk Substitutions
• Infant Foods
• Add Infant Formula Flexibilities and Create a Separate Food Package for Partially (Mostly) Breastfeeding Participants
• Whole Wheat Bread,
• Whole Grain Bread, and Whole Grain Options
• Canned Fish
• Legumes and Eggs
• Maximum Monthly Allowances