Have you ever picked up an item at the grocery store just because on the packaging it said that it was “calcium-fortified” or “vitamin fortified”? The proper word for these types of products is nutraceuticals or functional foods. Nutraceuticals can be processed or natural, depending on the kind of food. In a year alone, Americans have spent 27 billion dollars on these goods, showing their trust and love for them. Some people might believe that extra vitamins or calcium benefit the human body. But is it the case? Or maybe it could hurt the human body in subtle but dangerous ways? “Functional foods” may not be what is promoted, and many experts have spoken out against them. Nutraceuticals or functional foods do not differ from junk food because of nutritional incompletion, refineries and procession, and fallacious advertisements.
Functional foods usually lack certain nutrients, making them nutritionally incomplete. Sometimes, the nutrients are imbalanced. Therefore we might have too much of a particular nutrient and need more of another. According to Body Dynamic’s Functional Foods, “functional foods” can become very unhealthy by increasing the nutrients you don’t need .” Having too many nutrients is as harmful as having nutritional deficiencies. In another article by Mount Sinai, we learn that having too much of one nutrient leads to “multiple vitamin overdose,” which increases the risks of low blood pressure, lung damage, and liver problems, nausea, diarrhea, and stomach cramps. Severe cases include falling into a coma or even death. Take eating too many nutritional gummies, for example, and it can cause you to have. Also, some functional foods contain a lot of antioxidants, which can sometimes aggravate the existing health conditions of the consumer. Although these risks are small, over-consuming nutraceuticals can affect one’s health and well-being.
Most functional foods are processed, such as sports drinks and candy bars, meaning that more sugar, salt, and fat may be added to them. An example would be sports drinks, which have rising popularity worldwide as a “functional beverage .”However, drinking sports drinks without exercising is a huge health concern. Despite having lower sugar levels than regular soda, popular sports drinks contain a whopping 21 g of sugar every 12 ounces. It is alarming because, according to the AHA, the average adult woman should consume no more than 21 g of sugar daily, and the average adult man should consume no more than 36 g daily. Sure, sports drinks are promoted as healthy, but according to the daily mail, sports drinks can actually “slow you down” while doing sports. Promoting sports drinks to younger children who do not practice a sport professionally can be even more harmful because they sometimes contain caffeine and turn them hyper. Therefore, processed functional drinks such as sports drinks bring us more bad than good.
Most functional foods are processed with fallacious advertisements, which scams the upper middle class and the wealthy to buy them. Nutraceuticals are sold at a relatively high price, and with those untrue but appealing advertisements, the more privileged tend to purchase them as a way to “improve” their health. Food scientists like Marion Nestle have spoken up against functional foods. She claims that functional foods are all about marketing and that the market “deludes people into thinking [these things] are healthy .”The commercial market has been living off our money for “functional foods” since those products are relatively expensive. Aside from the high prices, those products are not exactly what they claim to be. Even though the vitamins might be natural, sugar and calories are still very much existent in those foods, and only they use the vitamins to “distract” them. Functional foods are only so well marketed because of the advertisements that proved to be misleading to some. Manufacturers did not bother to reveal that there were still unhealthy fats and substances in the product, leaving the consumer up to their judgment.
In conclusion, functional foods are less healthy than they are often perceived to be because they lack certain nutrients, processed and non-natural states, and untrue advertisements. In recent years, functional foods or nutraceuticals have become popular, especially among the wealthy. It has become a way for the manufacturers to suck money out of us by selling us all sorts of foods that claim to be healthy at a high price. Even though less fortunate people are also victims of unhealthy diets, the wealthy have been scammed. They have invested so much into these so-called “functional foods,” yet all they have consumed was junk food disguised as better. It is also essential for society to learn about the reality of the food we have been putting in our mouths and work together to end this scamming way of earning. Knowing that not all nutraceuticals are as beneficial as they seem, we can try to avoid them as much as possible. Filling in on fruits, vegetables, and fresh protein might be way healthier than spending excess money on functional foods!
Comments