"Many Seattle restaurants and smaller chains have already shifted to trans-fat free products, or are in the process of doing so. They say that it is an important issue to their customer base and they want to make them happy. The fact that these changes are already taking place could encourage the Board of Health to move forward with the issue."


WHAT?!?! Seriously?

How about the fact that these changes are already taking place should mean that the GOVERNMENT doesn't need to step in and legislate this?

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Okay, I do not get it. I saw the same stuff Frank posted on another trans-fat-banning post on here last week, and now it's starting on this one, too. No one has any problem with the government regulating other health issues in restaurants, like hygiene, work surface cleanliness, pest infestations, rat droppings in your soup, and the like. But OH MY GOD, if anyone touches my TRANS-FATS, it turns into the *Evil Big Brother*. Good grief, get over it already. Trans fats are a toxin, and a completely unnecesary one at that. No restaurant needs to use them for anything they make, and could've made the changes YEARS ago at a fractional increase in price. But most of them didn't, because frankly they don't give two sh*ts about your health, they just care about their profit margins (no matter how often they make press releases that they're "working on it"). Shoot, there's a bunch of countries in Europe that have banned trans fats outright. If our restaurants were so serious about getting rid of them, they could've called Denmark a decade ago for some tips and gotten on with it.

Your restaurant food will remain the same. You can still get your fries, and your biscuits, and your whatever else, they'll just be much less likely to KILL YOU. And if you're still just P-O'ed that you can't get trans fats in restaurants, then head home and plop on the couch with a can of Crisco and a spoon--eat to your heart's content. Heck, have a side of rat droppings, if you want.

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I would be much more in favor of requiring reporting of trans-fat (and saturated fat for that matter), and other nutritional information, then let the consumer decide what they want to order. If we live in a free market society (which I _think_ we do), then we should be spending more time educating people to make informed choices rather than forcing the goverments choices on them.

I am not so much concerned about preserving my "rights" to eat trans-fat, but I would much rather the government work at making it easier for me to find out what is in my food. If they ban trans-fat, but allow a ton of saturated fat, then are we really any better off? Also, I am beginning to wonder where it all ends anyway.

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@Robyn,
I'm with Frank. Keep your hands off my trans fats. Trans fats may be bad for me, but I prefer to make lifestyle choices on my own, rather than have my tax dollars go towards enforcing these kinds of laws. Do I think you should be forced to ingest trans fats? No-- I just don't think my favorite eateries should be forced to inconvenience themselves and possibly change the recipes of some of my favorite foods because big brother and his supporters think they know what's best for me.

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You know what, the right to make lifestyle choices is totally fair. I have only two humble suggestions to this end: (1) we make some attempt to force restaurants to actually provide meaningful and accurate information (i.e., not what's being provided now, which is demonstrably false in most cases) about the nutritional value of their products--probably just as difficult and expensive to enforce, incidentally. If we can't do this, then the whole "make your own choices" is moot, since one cannot make reasonable choices without good info. (2) Require people who choose to indulge in dumb lifestyle choices to pay additional premiums for their health insurance, as in the case of smoking. I'm sick of picking up the distributed tab for people who just can't deal with french fries fried in peanut oil. Find a way to accomplish these things, and I'll be right on board with getting rid of government regulation on trans fats. Since, of course, there's no way on God's green earth that either of these will happen (and to the extent that they do, the first one will simply be drown out in billions of $$ in advertising anyway), I'm still for regulation. I'd rather have my tax dollars going towards preventing coronary heart disease than paying for its treatment later (yay, Medicare!).

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Thanks for looking out for us all Robyn. I love that your suggestions both start with "force" and "require". Maybe you should "choose" to stay home and live your gluten-trans-fat-glucose-free lifestyle in a bubble by yourself?

And on number 2, I am assuming you're ready to support a ban on things like mountain climbing, kayaking, and white water rafting? I'm tired of people and helicopters and time and money going to waste in order to clean up after people like these Mt Hood climbers make their stupid and unnecessarily risky decisions just to get a thrill.

It's life, and it can be deadly. But the beginnings of a bad decision-- people paying for other people's health care-- doesn't merit making further bad decisions down the road. The FDA, or the USDA, or whoever comes up with these ideas of what's bad and what's good don't even know themselves. How often are they going to go back and forth on coffee, red wine, chocolate, butter, and so on? They're the reason we went from saturateds like butter and lard to unsaturated like margarine and Crisco in the first place.

And after a demonstrable record of failure, you're ready to force everyone to accept their latest conjecture in every circumstance, instead of letting people decide for themselves. If you don't trust the restaurant you eat at to tell you what they are using, you really shouldn't eat there anyway, trans-fats are the least of your problems.

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"If they ban trans-fat, but allow a ton of saturated fat, then are we really any better off?"

Yes. Much better off. Demonstrably so. Trans fats are just about the worst thing you can eat these days, short of rat turds and motor oil (both of which, I believe, are regulated by our friendly local governments). Saturated fats raise your LDL cholesterol (the bad stuff), but leave your HDL cholesterol (the good stuff) alone. Trans fats, on the other hand, both raise your LDL, AND lower your HDL--a double whammy. So trading out trans fats for saturated fats is actually MUCH better for you. Also, trans fats have been linked with other health fun things, like some kinds of cancer, and interfering with the mylenation of your neural connections--that's right, they might be making you dumber! Maybe the restaurants are hoping that if they load us up on trans fats, they'll rot our brains sufficiently that we won't be able to understand the arguments against eating them in the first place! (I smell a conspiracy theory... da-da-DA!)

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To Book Fan:

*sigh* Yes, I did use the terms "force" and "require", specifically in relation to restaurants, because to date restaurants have been incredibly unwilling to provide reasonable info to their customers. They've lobbied hard to prevent labelling laws. Even when restuarants decide to provide nutritional info (i.e., McDonald's), it is shown repeatedly to be wrong. I'm all for lack of regulation when it works. But we've tried it, and it is not working.

And as for the red herring about dangerous activities--of course I'm not in favor of banning them. But I suggest you check your insurance policy the next time you want to jump out of a plane with some nylon strapped to your back. I'd bet my salary (heh) that they'll call your injuries/death "reckless negligence" (or something similar) and wash their hands of you. Sorry.

If you're not in favor of distributed health care costs, fine. That's for a totally different blog. But we've got it, and so we'd better deal with it. And fair enough about the radical flip-flopping on good/bad foods. I think they're pretty clear on trans fats, but I can see why a reasonable person would be wary. So be it.

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Robyn,
I am quite familar with the "evils" of trans-fats. I have been against using maragine (and eating liver) since I first took biochemistry 17 years ago. And, to your point, rat turds are probably better for you than trans-fats anyway (depending on what the rat has eaten), but much less appealing). BUT I think we can all do without the hyperbole.

I am not going to fall over dead from heart disease or cancer from eating some trans-fats, and I am not going to turn stupid from eating a criso containing cookie. What I am talking about is taking responsibility for my own actions, and making informed decisions.

As far as the saturated fat issue, too much of this will also lead to heart disease. Are you proposing we should ban butter (and lard?) from restuarants? Should we also ban enourmous portions that make it easier to overeat? After all, both of these things contribute to heart disease and obesity, which cost us all money. My point earlier was that maybe we should work on making consumers more educated, and get them (meaning all of us) to take more responsibility for ourselves and our children. I do not what the goverment to tell me what to feed (or not feed) my kids, but I appreciate them giving me nutritional information to make informed choices.

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Stephanie,
Yes, I was using hyperbole; I was actually just trying to keep things light and more-or-less noncombative, but I guess it didn't come across properly. I'm sure it doesn't look like it from my previous posts, but I am actually very much in favor of deregulation where it works. But I no longer have any faith in the restaurant industry to give us good info about what we're eating (thus precluding any ability on our part to make informed choices), and even less faith that they give one whit about my health in the face of their profits. I would genuinely love to leave these decisions to the consumer, but the restaurant industry has made this almost literally impossible. Add to this the multi-billion dollar advertising efforts they push (during Saturday morning cartoons, even), and it's hopeless. I do not have thousands of dollars to combat the effects of the restaurant industries highly-effective, extensively researched, carefully targetted advertisements in my children, or in my community.

Where will it all stop, as you ask in your first post (i.e., should we ban butter, too? Lard?)? I don't really know. I don't like the idea of a parent state. But on the other hand, when most people living in the state are acting like children, maybe that is what we need. The restaurant industry has gone to great lengths (and spent tons of money) to prevent changes like independent analysis of their foods, CDC-compliant cooking procedures, and reasonable health and safety changes for their employees. They are not acting like responsible adults, and so maybe they should be treated like children in a nanny-state. And we, as consumers, sure aren't going out of our way to find out what we're eating or how much of it is reasonable. If restaurants thought they could get away with smaller portions, wouldn't they? But we (as consumers) cry foul if our plates aren't dripping with food, and for cheap, too. We're not really acting like responsible adults, either. So maybe we need a parent, too. Do I like saying this? No, I hate it. But I'm really worried that this is the case. And so, yes, I'm back to favoring regulation. I have no idea where it will end, but that by itself is not a reason for preventing it from ever beginning.

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Robyn - just shut up. Worry about your own health, not mine, thanks very much. The reason we know about trans fats is due to independent research and dissemination of the data. The government - at local, state and federal levels is always last to inform us and last to act. And when it does it's inefficient and costly, like government always is. The more power you give it, the more it will take. I don't want you, the government or anyone else deciding what or where I eat. Those health and safety laws you laud are no more efficient than anything else the government pokes its nose into. The miracle of the marketplace works far more efficiently and would serve us all better. In a choice between "buyer beware", or "tax-paying citizen beware" I know what I'd choose.

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We're a community of people who think about what goes in our mouths. There is a large fraction of the population who can't adequately consider the risks of trans fat - a risk that is quite quantifiable - a pack of Marlboros a day and a 5-gram slug of trans fat (two KFC biscuits, or a large order of McDonalds fries) are equivalents in coronary risk. This is a food adulterant - it got put on the market without safety testing, it remains in spite of scientific evidence of harm, and it's so bloody cheap compared to the alternatives that without being compelled, too many restaurant operators will keep using it.

Consider the analogy of lead paint - you and I are smart enough not to eat it. . .but we don't let even the professionals use it anymore, because people who can't evaluate the risk might be exposed to it. This isn't politics, this isn't big brother, it's just public health, and there's lots of reasons to keep people healthy.

Here's a great one for conservatives; your tax dollars go to support Medicare, and the majority of costs for cardiovascular disease are shifted to later life. Banning trans fats will mean your tax dollars aren't going to provide care for people with cardiac disease as a result of bad lipid consumption. Thinking of it that way, you should feel much better now.

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Check the nutritional label on a can of Crisco ...

There are NO trans fats in Crisco ...

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And if we got rid of Medicare and let the marketplace work without inefficient government and goody-two-shoes types who think they know better than the next person interfering with our lives then we wouldn't have the health care tax in the equation. The same brutal capitalistic efficiency and low prices you cite as being the reason po' folks eat so poorly would work in their favor with an unregulated health care industry. Target, Walmart, Home Depot, Best Buy and any number of other retailers constantly bring prices down so that people on low incomes today enjoy the choice and luxury only royalty would have enjoyed just 50 years ago. Perhaps we should have a Medicare for the retail industry to make it work better? Or perhaps one for the food industry. I don't think you'd be enjoying even ten percent of the food items you expect to see on the supermarket shelves if the government had taken control of the food industry at the same time it decided Medicare was good medicine for us.
If you let people be free to choose then they will look after their own best interests and choose what's right for them. If you think you know better than them and want to levy taxes so that you - or someone - can make better decisions on how they spend their hard-earned money you're nothing but a Socialist. Go and live in a Socialist country. They'll protect you from trans-fats. And they'll throw in a bunch of other freedoms with it. Or maybe you like it that way...

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(Becki's rudeness in post #11 notwithstanding) This has been an interesting discussion. I have to agree with Stephanie to a point, that we should prefer to allow people to make their own informed choices, and (I would say) resort to governmental regulation only as a last resort. The problem line is that this is what we've been trying for years, and it is failing. Free market proponents claim that the "miracle of the market" will correct these problems for us; people will stop patronizing bad restaurants and choose foods that are good for them. But that simply is not happening. We know now how bad TFs are for us, and have for decades--but McD's isn't exactly slipping into the red. Places like Outback Steakhouse, Applebees, Cracker Barrel and the like are growth industries. Most Americans know that fast food is bad for them, and yet 1 in 4 will eat it today. That is WAY more than "occasional treat" usage. The free market does not correct to the good, or to the healthy, it corrects to the cheap. The restaurant industry, if left unopposed, will continue to do whatever it can to keep its profit margins as high as possible, without any regard for the public good. If that means making public statements that they "will remove TFs by XXX date" only to quietly rescind those statements later, or they introduce a new line of "healthy" salads, which are nothing like healthy, it doesn't matter. They will cater to the new health-consciousness of Americans just so far as they need to to keep us coming through their doors (and then they'll typically even stop those efforts). That is the free market.

The free market has had decades to correct this, and it has failed. It is time to intervene. Even Adam Smith--progenitor of the modern notion capitalism and patron saint of all free market proponents--thought that corporations like restaurants should be regulated. This is why.

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Tammy,
(regarding #13) I am sitting here with a can of Crisco in my lap, looking at the label. The first, and in fact only, ingredient is "partrially hydrogenated soybean and cottonseed oil with mono- and diglycerides." Those ARE trans fats. Partially hydrogenated=TFs. The nutrition facts lists 3g of TFs per tablespoon.

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Eric--
"There is a large fraction of the population who can't adequately consider the risks of trans fat - a risk that is quite quantifiable - a pack of Marlboros a day and a 5-gram slug of trans fat (two KFC biscuits, or a large order of McDonalds fries) are equivalents in coronary risk."

Am I to take from this that we should ban cigarettes too? We have already gone quite far in this, most of which I agree with, since much of the cigarette "banning" (i.e., not in public places), protects those who do NOT have choice (from second hand smoke). However, if I choose to eat trans fats, then that is _my own_ risk, not yours. I am not a smoker and never have been, but I am still not in favor of a ban on cigarettes outright.

Also-- to Robyn, I find the "we have tried to get them to tell us an they won't" argument a bit simplistic. Perhaps the methods that have been used are not the right ones (no enforcement, too many exceptions, etc)? I think that the best route is to educate the public about these things, then they (we) will demand more information, or choose to cook at home more where we control the ingredients maybe? I am not going to argue that everyone will do this, or that it will work 100%, it won't, but if most of their customers choose to spend a bit more for TF free french-fries, I bet even McD's would start to think about it...

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Stephanie,
Yes, I certainly didn't go into any detail about the "they won't tell us" argument, but I have found the full version of it very convincing. It has much to do with the fact that the only educational efforts going right now have a few million dollars to spend on educating everyone they can, versus the multi-billion dollars that the food industry spends countering this education with advertisements and tax-deductible "school donations". It gets worse if you include not just restaurants, but the whole food industry. They also spend billions every year in lobbying efforts to manipulate or defeat even the most reasonable efforts to educate our population--e.g., labeling laws, USDA pyramid placements, etc. It is simply nothing like a fair playing field--the educators don't stand a chance against these odds, and we're seeing the fruits of the food industry's efforts now. I am easily persuaded that banning TFs, for example, might not be right way to go about changing our behaviors, but I do not see any way of avoiding some sort of regulatory change--something has got to give. Either we regulate the amount the food industry can spend on advertisements, the times and ways they can advertise (similarly to the rules regarding alcohol and tobacco), the ways that the food industry can infiltrate our schools (e.g., no more textbooks put out by the Snicker's Corporation), or regulate the sorts of toxic products restaurants use to cheapen their foods. Or, I guess, we could keep going the way we are, when every dollar the educators spend is countered by over $10,000 of finely tuned advertising and lobbying. The battle is already over. The market has now firmly established the winner, and it's the food industry. The educators have lost without regulation.

For all of this, there *are* good efforts out there attempting to educate us, and one of my favorites is http://parentsagainstjunkfood.org. There is also http://www.slowfoodusa.org. Both are very impressive. However, both typically only manage to preach to the choir--if you're looking at their work, you probably already agree with them and know what they're saying. We've got to bring the food industry back into the ring--they're playing out of bounds right now; or rather, they're playing in-bounds, but the boundaries are absurd and (I think) must change.

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Robyn, why can't you just concern yourself with your own health and that of your family? I bet you probably pay extremely close attention to what you eat and drink yourself, and what you feed you family. This enlightened self-interest of the individual consumer is precisely what makes the (or "a") free marketplace work. What doesn't work anywhere near as well is government regulation. Education, perhaps, but regulation and taxation, no.
And the last time I looked, lobbying is protected under the first amendment: free speech.

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Guess what?!? I have this *wacky* belief that products, when used as directed by consumers, shouldn't demonstrably shorten their lives. Leaded gas, Rely tampons (P&Gs toxic shock syndrome-inducing blunder), Vioxx. . . all of these things, when used as intended by the manufacturers, contributed to death and disease. Why are trans and tobacco exempt?

Trans fats get away with it through history of use, and some very powerful soybean interests, just like the decline of the palm oil market was decried by british and dutch interests in the last part of the 20th century. The difference is, Cargill, ADM and other midwest agricultural influences are incredibly politically connected. Just like tobacco farmers and tobacco companies.

I'm not a big conspiracy theorist...I'm just aware that it's not always about quality and safety with these guys, especially when the risk can be spread over many decades and many producers.

Trans is not a tasty food product; it's an adulterant, like rat shit, e coli or metal filings, and should be regulated as such. If you want to introduce new food ingredients today, you have to test them to get Generally Recognized As Safe status - why shouldn't trans fats have to do the same thing?

As for the ingredient list...
SOYBEAN OIL, SUNFLOWER OIL, FULLY HYDROGENATED PALM OIL, MONO- AND DIGLYCERIDES, TBHQ AND CITRIC ACID (ANTIOXIDANTS).

When fats are fully hydrogenated, they can meet a legal, if not technical definition of trans fat free. Traces remain, and the process is controllable to whatever end you like - it's more like setting a dimmer switch for how much trans- you can end up with, not "none" or "all". Fully-hydrogenated palm or cottonseed oil is...pretty gross stuff (think candles, not pastry), and you probably wouldn't choose to use it based on the taste or texture.

Could one of the opponents of the ban respond with what makes these so essential for our food security, or quality or safety? That's the point that I'm unable to grasp, and I think I come at this more informed than most consumers. (I haven't had a bite of margarine in 15 years, and I can tell you the metabolic differences between ruminant-manufactured trans- fats and synthetics).

Eric

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