Fast Food Health Concerns

RLF Staff

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What do we not know about the fast food that we eat? When we run to places and grab a quick order to go, are we ruining our health?

A recent lawsuit was filed against KFC in an attempt to stop them from cooking with partially hydrogenated oil which is high in fact and switch to other types of cooking oils. While KFC does provide figures to the inquiring consumer in stores or online, the contention is that the information is not as accessible as the advertising promoting the product and therefore misleading. Michael Jacobsen, the executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (http://www.cspinet.org), states that Yum Brands Inc (the parent company of KFC) knows that other healthier cooking products are available and states that, "it recklessly puts its customers at risk of a Kentucky Fried Coronary."

The Food and Drug Administration (http://www.fda.gov) states that foods high in trans fat actually raise bad cholesterol. In fact, as of January 2006, the Nutrition Facts label on products must now carry a separate line listing out the total Trans Fat in the item. Learn more about Trans Fat at the FDA page at http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~dms/transfat.html.