Not child's play: How safe are baby foods in US supermarkets?

For a very long time, easily available baby foods have been considered healthy.

However, according to a new study, up to two-thirds of baby foods sold in grocery stores in the United States are harmful.

The purpose of the study was to bring the widespread use of false claims on the packaging of these products to the immediate notice of parents and legislators.

Unhealthy baby food products

The study was done by the George Institute for Global Health and published on Wednesday in the peer-reviewed journal Nutrients.

As per the study, 60 per cent of 651 foods marketed for children aged six months to 36 months in American supermarkets did not meet the recommended nutritional guidelines for infant and toddler foods by the World Health Organization (WHO).

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Almost none of the food matched all of the WHO’s advertising guidelines, which centre on genuine health claims and legible ingredient labelling.

The researchers discovered that out of all the products, 70 per cent fell short of WHO guidelines for protein content and 25 per cent did not meet recommendations for calories. Among diets for infants or toddlers, one in five had salt concentrations higher than recommended by the group.

The study examined more than 650 items that were taken in 2023 from the infant food section of 10 large US stores. Dairy products and other chilled foods marketed to kids were not examined.

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The study did not reveal the names or brands of the foods.

The WHO Regional Office for Europe’s 2022 recommendations for commercially produced baby and toddler foods were implemented by the researchers using nutrition and promotional guidelines.

These recommendations are an attempt to solve the worldwide confusion around the guidelines for foods that are nutritionally sound for infants and toddlers.

Added sweeteners in food pouches

Baby food pouches were among the unhealthiest goods evaluated, with fewer than seven per cent of them meeting recommended daily intakes for sugar. The product’s popularity has increased by a staggering 900 per cent in the last 13 years.

A quarter of the products had hidden or added sweeteners, and 44 per cent of the foods for babies and toddlers had more sugar than what the WHO recommended, according to Dr Elizabeth Dunford, the senior study author and associate assistant professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

“Research shows 50 per cent of the sugar consumed from infant foods comes from pouches, and we found those were some of the worst offenders,” she said, as per CNN.

Fast food solutions: a major concern

Researchers have drawn attention to the alarming growth in newborns and young children’s consumption of processed convenience foods.

“Early childhood is a crucial period of rapid growth and when taste preferences and dietary habits form, potentially paving the way for the development of chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes and some cancers later in life,” Dunford said in a release_._

“Our findings highlight the urgent need for better regulation and guidance in the infant and toddler foods market in the United States - the health of future generations depends on it,” said Dunford.

Busy parents are increasingly choosing such convenience foods, “unaware that many of these products lack key nutrients needed for their child’s development and tricked into believing they are healthier than they really are,” the release quoted Dunford as saying.

Misleading advertising

The study discovered improper marketing techniques when looking at food packaging.

Among the packaging, 99.4 per cent of the products had at least one violation of the law.

Of these, 70 per cent said they were “non-genetically modified,” 59 per cent said they were “organic,” 37 per cent said they were “free of BPA,” and 25 per cent said they were “free of artificial colours or flavours.”

“The reason we call it the Wild West when we talk about the baby food aisle is that manufacturers get to pick and choose which elements of their product they want to highlight. They certainly don’t highlight the bad stuff, right? If their product is high in sugar, they’re just going to say, ‘no added colours or flavours’ on the label,” CNN quoted Dunford as saying.

The researchers discovered that 62 per cent of all products in the study featured general health and nutrition claims, while 58 per cent included claims concerning particular constituents.

Researcher Daisy Coyle said that these kinds of statements are giving these items a fictitious “health halo,” adding, “The lack of regulation in this area leaves the door wide open for the food industry to deceive busy parents.”

In some cases, the names of products were misleading too.

“Snack and finger foods often referred to fruit or vegetables in the product name, despite primarily being made of flour or other starches,” Coyle said.

Lack of regulations

Food safety and handling guidelines are provided by the US Food and Drug Administration, which has also imposed rules on baby food ingredients and formula concentrations.

“Are there regulations in different countries specific to infant and toddler foods? The short answer is no, but in Europe, the UK, New Zealand and Australia, where I’m from, there are broader regulations about how ingredients can be listed on the package that also impact foods fed to children,” Dunford said.

According to CNN, to illustrate, she explained that if a savoury dish consisted of 10 per cent of spinach, eight per cent beef, and two per cent potato, with the remaining portion being apples or pears, which are frequently used as sweeteners in baby foods, the name of the product in those nations might be “Pear, spinach, beef and potato pie.”

Additionally, according to Dunford, manufacturers in such nations must prominently display percentages on the label, such as “spinach (10 per cent) beef (eight per cent) and potato (two per cent), making it evident how much pear or apple is included.”

She says there are no such regulations in the US, which makes it more challenging to understand the ingredients in the products one is purchasing.

She added that only 31 per cent of non-fruit pouches fulfilled WHO standards for total sugar, which could be attributed in part to these hidden sweeteners.

With inputs from agencies