Mar 08, 2024 05:00:00

It has been pointed out that tobacco companies have popularized junk food in America.

In the United States, highly palatable foods that contain a combination of fat and salt, called

junk food , are popular. A study by the University of Kansas in the United States points out that food brands owned by American tobacco companies spread junk food to consumers in the 1980s.

US tobacco companies selectively disseminated hyper‐palatable foods into the US food system: Empirical evidence and current implications - Fazzino - 2024 - Addiction - Wiley Online Library
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/add.16332

Big Tobacco's Legacy: Pushing Hyperpalatable Foods in America - Neuroscience News
https://neurosciencenews.com/hyperpalatable-foods-big-tobacco-23906/

Major American tobacco companies

Philip Morris and RJ Reynolds invested heavily in the American food industry from 1988 to 2001, making acquisitions such as Kraft Foods Inc. and Nabisco .

Tera Fazzino, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Kansas, said, ``Many hyper-palatable foods (HPFs) were developed at food companies owned by tobacco companies, and as a result, tobacco companies' influence on the American food market increased. We speculate that this may be a significant factor.'

HPF is food that contains a lot of fat, sugar, salt, carbohydrates, etc., also called junk food, and is considered to be addictive. In addition, previous research by Mr. Fazzino has shown that 68% of the American food supply falls under HPF, and it is known that the majority of food sources in the United States fall into this HPF.

Based on Fazzino's past

papers , the research team investigated 105 types of foods developed by food companies owned by tobacco companies and 587 types of other foods. They found that foods developed by tobacco food companies were 29% more likely to be palatable in fat and salt, and more likely to be palatable in carbohydrates and salt than other foods. was shown to be 80% higher.

'This data doesn't tell us why tobacco companies developed so many highly palatable foods,' Fazzino said. It is an undeniable fact that the company was involved in the development and sale of highly palatable foods.'

In fact, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has found that the rate of `` metabolic syndrome ,'' which increases the risk of heart disease, stroke, and diabetes associated with obesity, increased from 1988 to 2012 among all groups in the U.S. population. has been reported .

From the early 2000s to the mid-2000s, tobacco companies withdrew from the American food market, but their influence still remains today. A University of Kansas study shows that palatable foods high in fat, salt, and carbohydrates are so low in availability that they have become a mainstay of Americans' diets. .

Ashley Gearhart, a psychology professor at the University of Michigan who was not involved in the study, said, ``All addictive foods are taken from nature and altered, processed, and refined to make them more satisfying.'' But we treat these foods like they're natural products, when in fact they're from big tobacco companies.'