Junk Food can seriously damage your health

The food industry is constantly changing and renovating itself and the same applies to the information that must be reported on the labels of the various food products. There is an increasing amount of information reported on the label in order to protect and inform consumers.

However, the latest idea submitted to the general assembly of the World Health Organisation is shocking: labelling junk food with the same warning messages that appear on cigarettes!

Consumer International and the World Obesity Federation (the organisations who submitted the proposal) believe that high obesity rates are becoming so concerning that they are turning into a health issue like smoking. There are currently more than half a billion overweight people in the world, 10% of men and 14% of women, mostly in developing countries.

The shocking proposal of the two organisations aims at raising awareness among consumers and avoiding the situation there was in the 1960s, when the tobacco industry used to claim there was nothing wrong with cigarettes and they were not harmful to health.

In the scientific world there are discordant opinions: treating obesity like a disease relieves consumers from their responsibilities, leading them to believe that they will become obese because they eat this or that bad food and not because of an unhealthy lifestyle.

Given the presence of political and scientific representatives from a number of countries, Expo Milano 2015 will be one of the places to discuss this provocative proposal, let’s see how it develops.