Posted on 10/17/2006 7:08:12 AM PDT by xrp
Two years ago Denmark declared war on killer fat, making it illegal for any food to have more than 2 percent transfats. Offenders now face hefty fines _ or even prison terms. The result? Today hardly anyone notices the difference.
The french fries are still crispy. The pastries are still scrumptious. And the fried chicken is still tasty.
Denmark's experience offers a hopeful example for places like Canada and the U.S. state of New York, which are considering setting limits on the dangerous artery-clogging fats.
Transfatty acids are typically added to processed foods such as cookies, margarine and fast food. They are cheaper to produce than mono-saturated fats, and give a longer shelf life to the foods they are added to.
Producers also argue that removing transfat from processed food will change certain tastes and textures beloved by consumers.
But they have been called the tobacco of the nutrition world. They lower good cholesterol while raising bad cholesterol.
Even consuming less than five grams of transfat _ the amount found in one piece of fried chicken and a side of french fries _ a day has been linked with a 25 percent increased risk of heart disease.
"No other fat at these low levels of intake, has such harmful effects," said Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, a cardiologist at Harvard's School of Public Health.
It is still too early to tell if removing transfat from food in Denmark has improved the country's health.
Although the Danish health ministry reports that cardiovascular disease has dropped by 20 percent in the last five years, similar reductions have been reported in other countries that are making an effort to combat heart disease by measures such as regulating the food and tobacco industries, and by educating the public about the need to exercise. In countries that are making no effort to regulate the amount of transfat in food, such as Hungary and Bulgaria, heart disease rates have continued to climb.
Denmark is the only country to have outlawed the fat, passing a law in June 2003 that made it illegal for any food to contain more than two percent of transfat.
For Danes like Troels Nyborg Andersen, the government's decision means he feels less guilty about his fast-food habit.
"I know transfats are bad, but you don't think about that when you're hungry," said the 27-year-old Copenhagen native, chomping a hamburger. "It's good that the Danish government got rid of transfats so that I don't have to worry about it."
That was the rationale that motivated the transfat ban.
"We wanted to protect people so that they would not even have to know what transfat was," said Dr. Steen Stender, one of the leading Danish experts who lobbied for the anti-transfat law.
Though obesity rates are rising in Denmark, they are far below those of most countries: just 11.4 percent of the Danish population was obese in 2005, less than half of Britain's obesity rate, estimated at 23 percent.
When faced with the prospect of a transfat ban, industries typically rebel. Other countries in the European Union initially objected to Denmark's ban, arguing it would be economically unfair since their foods could not be legally imported into Denmark.
Many producers were also concerned about the possible change in texture and taste without the additives.
Preserving the delicacy of the traditional Danish pastries was a major concern at Copenhagen's famed La Glace cafe, renowned for its pastries and cakes. When the transfat law kicked in, its bakers began experimenting.
"There was a bit of a crisis," admitted Marianne Stagetorn Kolos, La Glace's owner.
The first attempts were disastrous. The transfat-free margarines melted too soon, destroying the flakiness of the 81-layered pastries.
"Everything was flat," Stagetorn said. Luckily, the problem was solved by switching margarine suppliers.
Customers like Anne Petersen haven't noticed.
The pastries "taste just as good as they always did," said the 59- year-old sales assistant, who favors the raspberry pastry. "If it wasn't for the law, I never would have known that there wasn't any transfat."
Stender and other health experts say Denmark's transfat ban should be adopted worldwide.
"There's no reason it cannot be done elsewhere," he said, explaining that the food in Denmark is not markedly different from food anywhere else. "If you removed transfat from the planet, the only people who would feel the difference are the people who sell the transfat."
"Today hardly anyone notices the difference"
Meaning that, two years later, they are used to having the government telling them what they can and can't eat.
if you are going to a restaurant and eating food fried in the equivilent of WD-40, when do you get to think about what you are eating.
you can go back to Hamurabi's codes and see that if a builder builds a defective house and it falls on you and kills you, then the builder will also be killed.
Peace?
actually there is precidence for this.
COAL used to be used as a food coloring.
Turn of the LAST centurey food makers used whatever they wanted and never told the public.
If we could train people to eat plastic food, there would be no shelf life problem.
Remember folks this is for PROcESSED food with all those indiciferable chemicals listed on the side.
Back to butter and lard, the original health foods!.........
They become Europeans?
Just another government tit for the idiots to suckle.
I think we need to be clear on what trans fat is.
trans fat is a fat substitute which has a longer shelf life. It is cheep to use and produce.
This is like trying to market sacarin as sugar and not telling anyone.
I see where you are going with this, and we're probably on the same page to some extent. But hydrogenated oils are in so many foods and really not very good for you. You might think you are making a healthy choice with a whole wheat cracker with some peanut butter, but unless you look closely you don't know that they've put these poisonous fats in both products. It's hard to make a choice when you don't have one. Big Food likes it because they extend shelf life and are cheap, so they put it in almost any processed food you can find. But healthier substitues are available and I'm all for at least labeling of trans fat info so people can make informed choices.
I can't stand lard, but I make my own butter. I know exactly what's going into it, namely cream and nothing else.
Golly, thanks Nanny. Whatever would we do without you.
Now, would you make sure that the servings we get in restaurants are "healthy" and "balanced?"
...said the frogs, as they proceeded to boil.
It is still too early to tell if removing transfat from food in Denmark has improved the country's health.
Wait a minute, I thought Denmark was an "example". An example of what? Nothing health-related, apparently.
If each citizen had to think about every little detail and to be a chemistry expert, he would not have time for living. Government should prevent putting poisons into food.
Do not worry, your corporations will not go bankrupt because of this ban.
Usually longer shell "life" goes together with lower nutritional value and more problems with digestion.
In other words, if it is not good for bugs, it is not good for you.
Citizens should definitely think for themselves, but the producers and sellers of food need to be honest about what they actually put into food, and has an obligation not to add things that are destructive to general health.
Beats me. Ask the DEA.
No, but each Dane will be a little bit poorer, and eat food that is a little bit more stale. A mortal wound? No. What's one more cut among a thousand?
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