{"id":28243,"date":"2025-05-21T18:46:15","date_gmt":"2025-05-21T18:46:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=28243"},"modified":"2025-05-21T19:26:53","modified_gmt":"2025-05-21T19:26:53","slug":"american-breakfast-cereals-are-becoming-less-healthy-study-finds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=28243","title":{"rendered":"American Breakfast Cereals Are Becoming Less Healthy, Study Finds"},"content":{"rendered":"
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They contain increasing amounts of sugar, fat and sodium and decreasing amounts of protein and fiber.<\/p>\n

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Breakfast cereals, a heavily marketed, highly processed mainstay of the American diet, especially among children, are becoming less healthy, filled with increasing amounts of sugar, fat and sodium, according to a study<\/a> published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Network Open. The study also found that cereals\u2019 protein and fiber content \u2014 nutrients essential for a healthy diet \u2014 have been in decline.<\/p>\n

The findings, based on an analysis of 1,200 new or reformulated cereal products introduced in the United States between 2010 and 2023, are likely to add fuel to the ongoing debate about the relationship between processed food, mounting childhood obesity and the rising prevalence of chronic diseases.<\/p>\n

The debate has gained greater prominence in the months since health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. began using the federal bully pulpit to excoriate ultra-processed foods as part of his \u201cMake America Healthy Again<\/a>\u201d campaign. Mr. Kennedy, who has declared that \u201csugar is poison,\u201d last month announced<\/a> that the Department of Health and Human Services would work to remove some artificial dyes from the U.S. food supply, citing concerns about their impact on children\u2019s health.<\/p>\n

Shuoli Zhao, a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Kentucky and a co-author of the new study, said the findings were especially notable given evolving consumer awareness about the links between excess consumption of sugar, salt and saturated fat and chronic conditions like diabetes, hypertension and cancer.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cWhat\u2019s most surprising to me is that the healthy claims made on the front of these products and the nutritional facts on the back are actually going in the opposite direction,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The analysis, based on data gathered by the marketing consultancy Mintel, did not identify brand names, nor did it capture information on purchasing and consumption habits. The vast majority of the 1,200 products it analyzed were relaunches of existing cereals, including so-called reformulations that alter a product\u2019s taste or nutritional content, Professor Zhao said.<\/p>\n

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They contain increasing amounts of sugar, fat and sodium and decreasing amounts of protein and fiber.Breakfast cereals, a heavily marketed, highly processed mainstay of the American diet, especially among children, are becoming less healthy, filled with increasing amounts of sugar, fat and sodium, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Network Open. The study also found that cereals\u2019 protein and fiber content \u2014 nutrients essential for a healthy diet \u2014 have been in decline.The findings, based on an analysis of 1,200 new or reformulated cereal products introduced in the United States between 2010 and 2023, are likely to add fuel to the ongoing debate about the relationship between processed food, mounting childhood obesity and the rising prevalence of chronic diseases.The debate has gained greater prominence in the months since health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. began using the federal bully pulpit to excoriate ultra-processed foods as part of his \u201cMake America Healthy Again\u201d campaign. Mr. Kennedy, who has declared that \u201csugar is poison,\u201d last month announced that the Department of Health and Human Services would work to remove some artificial dyes from the U.S. food supply, citing concerns about their impact on children\u2019s health.Shuoli Zhao, a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Kentucky and a co-author of the new study, said the findings were especially notable given evolving consumer awareness about the links between excess consumption of sugar, salt and saturated fat and chronic conditions like diabetes, hypertension and cancer.\u201cWhat\u2019s most surprising to me is that the healthy claims made on the front of these products and the nutritional facts on the back are actually going in the opposite direction,\u201d he said.The analysis, based on data gathered by the marketing consultancy Mintel, did not identify brand names, nor did it capture information on purchasing and consumption habits. The vast majority of the 1,200 products it analyzed were relaunches of existing cereals, including so-called reformulations that alter a product\u2019s taste or nutritional content, Professor Zhao said.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28245,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28243"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28246,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28243\/revisions\/28246"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}