'Traffic light' health labels on food to tackle Britain's obesity epidemic

[everydayupsanddowns]

I'm pretty sure most people actually know very well what they think constitutes a healthy diet.

But

They also know that they don't like this... don't like that... thie partner doesn't like this... doesn't like that... That they all like a little treat every now and then. They know that it's hard to get kids to eat vegetables... that they only have 20 minutes to get something on the table

Eating fresh, good food is actually quite hard work. Many people's palettes have been schooled into preferring highly processed/refined alternatives. Alternatives which are cheap to buy and quick to prepare.

Added to which almost all the attention in coverage about obesity goes on fat and sugar which is only a small part of the story. You can get just as obese eating 'healthy' breakfast cereals, pasta and sandwiches and even if people considered the GDAs I know for a fact that I would gain weight on 300g of carbs a day - while for others it would be nothing like enough.

I don't really know what the government can do. With the ingenuity and weight of all the marketing messages in supermarkets screaming 'buy me!' 'eat me!' 'special offer' 'buy 6 for the price of 1' and the herd mentality of shoppers what chance does a leaflet or poster seen once or twice have?

 

[heasandford]

All the more reason to ensure that information given works for those who are going to use it!

I am starting to resent the traffic light sysytem even more!

It seems to me that the basic nutritional information is very straightforward, per 100g allows comparison between products Perhaps serving size needs to be made much clearer or left off, as packs usually have to have a weight on, although I have now discovered not necessarily with small indidvidual confectionary items (ie mars bars etc!), which seems ludicrously contradictory. Of course the trouble with campaigning for this would be that it feels like supporting the very things we 'shouldn't' be eating!

 

[heasandford]

Here is my e-mail reply from DUK -
Diabetes UK fully appreciates your comments and concerns and will take note of them.

Meanwhile I am linking you to info via our website on this subject which I hope you will find useful.

http://www.diabetes.org.uk/About_us/Media-centre/Traffic-light-system/

http://www.diabetes.org.uk/Guide-to...tes/Know-your-labels/Traffic-light-labelling/

http://www.diabetes.org.uk/About_us/News_Landing_Page/Call-for-clearer-food-labelling/

http://www.diabetes.org.uk/About_us...om-the-Food-Standards-Agency-and-Diabetes-UK/

http://www.diabetes.org.uk/Guide-to-diabetes/Food_and_recipes/

We do hope that this has been helpful, but please do get in touch with us again if you want to. You can also call the Careline on the number below if you would like to talk things through.

all a bit bland, and clearly they think traffic lights help. Oh well, I will respond to the consultation anyway!

 

[Shaqui]

Couldn't agree more!
The current 'traffic lights' are hopeless. In many cases the packaging designers opt to render the traffic lights all in one shade of the same colour where their product would be mostly 'red', while other quite questionable foodstuffs proudly display yellows and greens because the right questions are not being asked. And the leafy green stuff that people should be encouraged to eat more of - well that doesn't come in shiny full-colour printed packaging so doesn't get a traffic light on it at all.

Recently diagnosed as Type 2 (this past week) and already trying to get my head round all the dos/don'ts especially as my cholesterol is also high so 'low fat' can often mean 'higher sugar' (and vice versa!) 😡

I've just come back from my second shopping trip, the first big one, since, and as a graphic designer I was shocked at a couple of big names - Flora and Ryvita - blatant breaking the traffic light coding by having all green on one type because it's their brand colour! Fortunately I had the sense to double check, and a lite version of Flora had all blue(!) while the Ryvita had all orange on another and all maroon on a third! Surely their should be some regulation where green, orange and red (or any colour close enough to be interpreted as them) are forbidden from the labelling? Most opted for a neutral but surely these brands are not only taking the p*ss but endangering people's lives!? 😡

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

Hello Shaqui

Welcome to the forum 🙂

From what I have read you need to be quite careful about the whole 'saturated fat' issue in relation to cholesterol. From what I can tell the cholesterol that might result from consuming saturated fat is a) probably not very significant and b) going to be HDL (generally referred to as 'good' cholesterol).

High consumption of carbohydrate, on the other hand, is likely to result in elevated LDL ('bad' cholesterol) and triglycerides (the nastiest of all).

His blog post by well-known cholesterol skeptic Dr Malcolm Kendrick is quite technical, but very interesting nonetheless: http://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2015/06/23/what-happens-to-the-carbs/

 

[AlisonM]

Ratioining! Rationing is the answer, according to the statistics the population as a whole was more healthy under rationing than ever before or since. Everyone had an 'adequate' diet, or so I'm told. Or they could reinstate Home Ec and make it compulsory.

 

[Shaqui]

Hello Shaqui

Welcome to the forum 🙂

From what I have read you need to be quite careful about the whole 'saturated fat' issue in relation to cholesterol. From what I can tell the cholesterol that might result from consuming saturated fat is a) probably not very significant and b) going to be HDL (generally referred to as 'good' cholesterol).

High consumption of carbohydrate, on the other hand, is likely to result in elevated LDL ('bad' cholesterol) and triglycerides (the nastiest of all).

His blog post by well-known cholesterol skeptic Dr Malcolm Kendrick is quite technical, but very interesting nonetheless: http://drmalcolmkendrick.org/2015/06/23/what-happens-to-the-carbs/

Hi... Mike?

Thanks 🙂 It's my overall cholesterol which is high, as well as being - according to my Body Mass Index now - slightly obese. My 'bad cholesterol' level is actually the lower of the two. It's just in conjunction with diabetes, it puts me at a higher risk now of stroke and/or heart attack (that's besides the one you get looking at the price of 'healthy option' foods!) 😡😛

 

[Shaqui]

Has there been any - or is there ongoing - checking that the traffic labels are a/ accurate in grammage/percentage and/or b/ honest?

 

[Shaqui]

Also, regarding the traffic light coding, who actually 'regulates' (if such a term is applicable) so complaints can be made if you believe a company is in breach of accuracy or representation?

 

[Shaqui]

I'm having a lot of problems with the traffic light system... how can something have 0.2g be 3% and marked red, another which is 0.4g be 7% (amber) yet another be 0.5g - 3% - and green? I know that sometimes it's so much of a pack - half a tin, or a single slice, or some other fraction but is this just plain muddling the issue? 😡

 

[Northerner]

Personally, I pay no attention to the Traffic light system. I just concentrate on the amount of carbs in things, particularly fast-acting carbs, like sugar, but always noting total carbs since all carbs will affect my levels. I came to the conclusion that fat is pretty much irrelevant to me and I am fortunate that I don't need to watch my weight so I ignore calories as well, on the whole.

 

[robert@fm]

One thing I've noticed is that all the labels above list "sugars" instead of total carbohydrates, which would have been far more useful.

By the way, the picture is too wide (1280px); it probably looks OK on an HD (1920x1080) display, but I for one have a WXGA (1366x768) display, and large images such as the above mess up the forum for me. To be sure of displaying properly for everyone, images should be no larger than 800px.

 

[Northerner]

I've replaced the picture with a smaller version 🙂

 

[Shaqui]

By the way, the picture is too wide (1280px); it probably looks OK on an HD (1920x1080) display, but I for one have a WXGA (1366x768) display, and large images such as the above mess up the forum for me. To be sure of displaying properly for everyone, images should be no larger than 800px.

Sorry, I used the lowest resolution setting on my camera. I'll try and downsize more before uploading again

 

[Shaqui]

But back to a previously ignored question - and excuse my ignorance as I've only been diagnosed for about a month so haven't even been on a DESMOND course or met with a dietician yet - who actually determines the traffic light system, and monitors it to make sure it is a/ accurate or b/ not misleading? And are they open to being asked to check designers/brands/packaging are these?

 

[heasandford]

Not sure whether this will show but I'll try and post the regulations on here. Shaqui.

The criteria for ‘Low’ for each nutrient are based on the levels in the current European Union (EU) proposal on Nutrition and Health Claims. They have to be monitored by Trading Standards so you can complain to them, but take it up with the manufacturer or retailer first.

Oh dear, I can't copy and paste the table, hope this works instead -
Criteria per 100g

FAT
LOW (GREEN)≤ 3 g/100g OR ≤ 1.5 g/100 ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 3 - <20 g/100g OR > 1.5 - <10 g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 20 g/100g OR ≥ 10g/100ml
SATURATES
LOW (GREEN)≤ 1.5 g/100g OR ≤ 0.75 g/100 ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 1.5 - <5 g/100g OR > 0.75 - <2.5 g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 5 g/100g OR ≥ 2.5g/100ml
TOTAL SUGARS
Low (green)≤ 5 g/100g OR ≤ 2.5 g/100 ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 5 - <15 g/100g OR > 2.5 - <7.5 g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 15 g/100g OR ≥ 7.5g/100ml
SALT
LOW (GREEN)≤ 0.3 g/100g OR ≤ 0.3 g/100ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 0.3 - <1.5g/100g OR > 0.3 - <1.5g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 1.5 g/100g OR ≥ 1.5 g/100ml

 

[DaveB]

Hi. I wouldn't worry to much about traffic lights etc but do read the actual ingredients. You need to keep the carbs down and don't worry too much about fats. Protein is fine. The traffic light system is to some extent based around the 'fat is bad, carbs are good' mantra and not very helpful as carbs are not good for us.

 

[Shaqui]

Hi. I wouldn't worry to much about traffic lights etc but do read the actual ingredients. You need to keep the carbs down and don't worry too much about fats. Protein is fine. The traffic light system is to some extent based around the 'fat is bad, carbs are good' mantra and not very helpful as carbs are not good for us.

The thing is I have also, simultaneous to being diagnosed Type 2, been told my cholesterol is high, and that I should cut down on saturated fats. So as well as metformin, I'm on a statin too. Whether the latter is a permanent prescription, or I will be able to come off it if my cholesterol lowers through diet and exercise, has not yet been made clear to me. But at least my blood pressure was deemed to be pretty good, otherwise I'd be looking at traffic lights which are all green, and there ain't many of those! (Precious few with green sugar and saturates!) 😡

 

[Shaqui]

Not sure whether this will show but I'll try and post the regulations on here. Shaqui.

The criteria for ‘Low’ for each nutrient are based on the levels in the current European Union (EU) proposal on Nutrition and Health Claims. They have to be monitored by Trading Standards so you can complain to them, but take it up with the manufacturer or retailer first.

Oh dear, I can't copy and paste the table, hope this works instead -
Criteria per 100g

FAT
LOW (GREEN)≤ 3 g/100g OR ≤ 1.5 g/100 ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 3 - <20 g/100g OR > 1.5 - <10 g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 20 g/100g OR ≥ 10g/100ml
SATURATES
LOW (GREEN)≤ 1.5 g/100g OR ≤ 0.75 g/100 ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 1.5 - <5 g/100g OR > 0.75 - <2.5 g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 5 g/100g OR ≥ 2.5g/100ml
TOTAL SUGARS
Low (green)≤ 5 g/100g OR ≤ 2.5 g/100 ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 5 - <15 g/100g OR > 2.5 - <7.5 g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 15 g/100g OR ≥ 7.5g/100ml
SALT
LOW (GREEN)≤ 0.3 g/100g OR ≤ 0.3 g/100ml
MEDIUM (AMBER)> 0.3 - <1.5g/100g OR > 0.3 - <1.5g/100ml
HIGH (RED)≥ 1.5 g/100g OR ≥ 1.5 g/100ml

Thanks for that. Much appreciated!

 

[DaveB]

The thing is I have also, simultaneous to being diagnosed Type 2, been told my cholesterol is high, and that I should cut down on saturated fats. So as well as metformin, I'm on a statin too. Whether the latter is a permanent prescription, or I will be able to come off it if my cholesterol lowers through diet and exercise, has not yet been made clear to me. But at least my blood pressure was deemed to be pretty good, otherwise I'd be looking at traffic lights which are all green, and there ain't many of those! (Precious few with green sugar and saturates!) 😡

Some would say that saturated fats and blood cholesterol are not closley linked despite what we have been told. Many appear to find that a low carb diet with a sensible amount of fat improves the LDL/HDL ratio; it's not total cholesterol that matters but the ratio of LDL/HDL.