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Posted in: Nutrition / Nutrition Talk

Food additives: A request, a topic for discussion and an outburst

Hello! Thanks for coming into this weird topic.

I'll start with the request. I would like to see an experts article on food additives, and to what extent they interfere with our health 🧫🍎 (this is a request/idea, not a demand, I understand these articles are a huge investment, and there are sure more interesting topics).

What do you think of food additives and processed food? 🤔 I think it would be interesting to see different opinions on it. And hopefully get to a conclusion (even with nuances and "it depends"😆)

The outburst: Unfortunately I haven't had much luck with reasonable and polite discussions on this topic (not here of course! But elsewhere on the internet). This is a bit of a controversial topic, and it seems people exist in two opposite sides, and it's hard to get ideas across, specially when someone it's in the middle (like me) 🙄 it seems like everyone hears us as being defending the other side!

So, additives. Are they bad? Are they good? Do they have a place in our nutrition? Should we avoid them like the plague, consume in moderation, or there is no need for any restriction at all?

I see these two opposite sides: the ones that say that they are toxic, and we should restrict it's consumption as much as possible. And the side that says they are safe to be consumed in the doses existent in foods, that it's safety is vastly studied and tested, and that we shouldn't fear them.

My opinion is that:

Technically, they are not toxic. And I believe that, as far as the current knowledge goes, they are safe to be consumed in the doses added to processed food. Scientists and Food engineers are not trying to kill us 👩‍🌾

But I also know they are not nutritionally necessary, they are a way to make food convenient. And as with anything science, things are very complex, and compounds may interact with our systems in very unexpected ways. There is a correlation between processed food and health problems, and I don't see how that can be ignored. And health care practitioners generally suggest a processed food free diet for good health.👩‍⚕️

So, I'm still torn between these ideas. In practice, I consume only a few processed foods, and I don't feel guilty about it. But...how to know what the correct action is? How not to be in the wrong extreme? How to be balanced, based on facts? 🤯

If you got to the end of this, wow 👏🏻👏🏻 congratulations, thanks, and I would love to hear your opinion 😊