by Haley Lovin
Emily Eldh felt the frustration bubble up as yet another professional told her she was fine.
But was it fine to constantly feel exhausted, the energy drained from her body as she experienced frequent midday crashes? Was her lack of mobility, weight gain, and hot flashes at just 15 years old, “fine”?
No, it was definitely not “fine.”
She refused to live her life feeling isolated, suffering through her symptoms alone, and she was determined to figure out what was causing them.
As it turned out, changing her diet was the key.
The dangers of ultra-processed foods
Many Americans are concerned by the chemicals in their food, with 15% ranking it as their top concern regarding food safety.
And for good reason.
Ultra-processed foods that contain many such chemicals are largely responsible for food intolerance and chronic illnesses that are among the top killers in the world, including cancer, diabetes, heart disease, obesity, thyroid problems, and more.
Yet these UPFs make up 60% of the adult American diet and 70% of our kids’ diets.
The toll it's taking is obvious.
The death of 678,000 Americans a year is a result of chronic illnesses produced by ultra processed foods, and the lifespan of Americans is decreasing more than that of citizens living in economically comparable countries.
The reason for this is that ultra-processed foods are made up of unfamiliar ingredients you cannot find at home and are used to preserve pre-packaged food in order to make them seem more appealing to consumers.
Marketing and the frequent sales of UPFs within grocery stores lack disclosure and do not promote awareness pertaining to the health risks involved in the consumption of these foods.
Many cancer prevention, environmental, and public interest groups have since gone to court in an attempt to have the FDA get involved, urging them to enforce more restrictions and regulations on our food to prevent these diseases, including the removal of cancer causing synthetic flavors.
This is an ongoing issue, and it is imperative to understand the scope of how chemicals within processed foods are continuing to affect United States citizens, and how we can promote change.
Chemicals and their role in food production
It is vital to understand why chemicals are used in the first place, and how they cause food intolerances.
Dr. Phillip Davis, a former FDA employee, who now works in new pharmaceutical drug development, helps to explain this production process.
“We're a big country. It's much easier, like in England or Norway or Sweden, to grow organic food to feed the population, whereas here we have 300 million people that you’ve got to feed, and a vast majority of our produce is coming from California, Florida, and shipped across the country,” he said. “So you have to preserve it; you have to engineer it to feed a huge population of people.”
So how do these chemicals used in preservation and production affect how people are able to consume and digest food?
Twenty-two-year-old Bethany Kao found out she was gluten intolerant after being tested by a holistic doctor.
Her intolerance is different from celiac disease, an auto-immune disorder that causes an allergy to gluten. Instead, she developed an intolerance, or a sensitivity to gluten.
After consulting with a nutritionist, Kao was able to trace her intolerance back to the chemicals used on wheat.
A 2019 study found that patients with higher dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene (DDE) concentrations, a chemical found in agriculture, were twice as likely to have celiac disease.
“In an agricultural farming sense, people take roundup or, really, really heavily dangerous chemicals and they saturate their whole fields, or whatever they're planting,” Kao said. “They saturate it with that, and it kind of alters the wheat to a point where, I mean, it sounds horrible, but it's like poison.”
Kao sees this practice as nothing more than being slowly poisoned by much of her food.
Not only are insecticides such as DDE actively harming our food, and pesticides such as aflatoxin B1 and polychlorinated biphenyls, but also preservatives and additives.
There are still known carcinogens that are used in food production today, including the artificial sweetener saccharin, and vinyl chloride and acrylonitrile.
Ultra-processed foods are essentially no longer even food anymore, but rather these chemicals.
It is unfair that millions of people each day are becoming sick because of their ‘food’, and the long list of negative health impacts further verify Kao’s concerns.
Negative health effects
Like so many others, Eldh struggled daily, fighting against food-induced health problems that started from smaller symptoms, proliferating into something even more alarming.
“My food intolerance was developed actually after I developed my thyroid problem,” Eldh said. “They actually run in tandem to each other. So, developing the autoimmune issues actually caused me to then have a sensitivity to basically what felt like all foods.”
Thyroid problems are not something to take lightly and can be all-consuming.
Symptoms of an irregular thyroid may include anxiety, irregular heartbeat, tremors, insomnia, lethargy, constipation, hair loss, and more.
And having to meticulously search through every food label is an exhaustive process that no one, including Eldh, deserves.
Grains were among the many types of foods Eldh became sensitive to and cautiously avoided. And the chemicals sprayed on the grain caused even more inflammation, “Which is the core of pretty much every chronic illness,” she said. “That was the core of me having thyroid disease, and I call it misdiagnosed multiple sclerosis.”
Caroline Pond, College of Charleston student and sports nutrition intern for the school, said chemicals in processed foods remain the most prominent culprit for a host of diseases.
“Over time, the health impacts come down to a lot of autoimmunities, as well as cancer, studies show a decrease in longevity,” said Pond. “Issues within our hormones and imbalances and all these things that are affecting us later in life.”
Research confirms that people who consume high levels of ultra-processed foods, compared to those who consume low levels, have a much higher rate of cancer, obesity (diabetes), and mortality. This increase in cancer linked with UPFs can once again be traced back to the carcinogenic chemicals mentioned previously.
Obesity is an epidemic impacting millions wordwide, but the United States has one of the largest obesity populations across the globe, with obesity increasing by 130% over the last 30 years.
These health impacts suggest that UPFs are slowly corrupting regular bodily processes and taking years off our lives.
The many food intolerances caused by chemicals in processed foods not only include physical impacts, but also mental and emotional ones.
“I think the biggest thing that comes from all of that is you feel very isolated, because you feel like, you know, it's called an invisible disease,” said Eldh. "If you know, if your foot breaks, you can tell, because there’s a cast. But as far as, like, autoimmune issues, people have to go about their day-to-day life, suffering."
With anxiety and depression increasing in our generation, it is crucial that we do not allow processed food to continue amplifying the mental health impacts faced by so many.
It is hard to imagine that food has the power to affect our mood and happiness, but that is exactly what it is doing.
Kao developed a gluten intolerance at a young age, and because she is not celiac, she could tangibly feel what life was like before developing her intolerance, and after.
“When you can't eat the same food as everybody in the room. It is this very small, barely noticeable way that you kind of don't have community with them.”
Sklar Duncan has a dairy intolerance and also feels this same sense of separation.
“It can affect social things," she says. "I can't go off with my friends and do certain things because I'm gonna have to find an alternative to dairy, and a lot of them just don't taste great.”
Money and lack of accessibility
Although the United States has a tremendous population that requires an efficient way to feed everyone, the question remains, why are officials willing to compromise the health of millions by feeding citizens food ridden with chemicals?
The answer is simple – money.
Davis supports this and explains why money plays an active role in the safety of our food.
“So in my mind, there's a conflict of interest for the people who make up the food pyramid, which is basically the foods the government recommends we can eat. So I think a lot of it boils down to business and money.”
Although the government recommends that half of the consumer diet should consist of fruits and vegetables, as of 2019, only 4% of federal farm subsidies support their production and most subsidies go towards commodity crops like corn and soybeans.
These crops are sprayed with pesticides- harmful chemicals, and they are primarily used to produce unhealthy foods, including UPFs.
It is extremely expensive to live a healthier lifestyle and purchase alternatives to processed foods, which are far more accessible and affordable.
Davis explains these limitations to living a healthier lifestyle.
“There's tons of evidence to support the Mediterranean stock diet," Davis said of the diet known for its emphasis on plant-based foods, healthy fats, and fresh, unprocessed ingredients.
Davis adds that while it can be a simple diet, it's not usually in the price range for many Americans, particularly families that have a lot of people to feed and many other expenses.
"I say it's simple, it's not simple, I guess," he said. "It can be expensive and some people don't have access.”
Obviously, if you cannot afford to eat this kind of diet, you are automatically at a disadvantage.
Not only is the Mediterranean diet expensive, but Pond suggests that even shopping for regular groceries can be unattainable.
“I would say whole foods that are grown on a local level would be ideal," Pond said. "Although that's very hard for most people to access and or afford.”
As you are reading this, you yourself may not have this same problem, and while you may pick up fruits and vegetables from the store without a second glance at the price tag, many are far less fortunate.
“So I think this trend of holistic/wellness uprise we're seeing right now, I kind of see a disparity between those that can afford a lifestyle like that versus those that can’t afford that lifestyle,” said Pond.
But even those who have no problem affording food, it can often be hard to find healthy options to begin with.
Like Duncan, having a dairy intolerance can make it challenging to practice a healthy lifestyle, because finding alternatives are not always the healthier option.
“All the (dairy) alternatives have a lot of added ingredients that are bad," she said. "So it's hard to find a healthy option.”
This further illustrates how many with food intolerances have a hard time avoiding processed foods, pumped with chemicals, even though it will make them very sick.
However, this difficulty in living a healthier lifestyle and having access to alternatives is not nearly as prevalent in European countries.
“And I think that being a society that functions off of economics, that's what we're all about, but they (Europeans) aren't, but I think that they stay rooted in their farms and their land and their traditions and their family recipes,” said Pond.
Not only is the production of food in Europe generally healthier -- with only 14-44% consuming UPFs compared to 60% in the United States -- but the culture cares strongly for the dietary needs and health of its citizens.
“But one thing that was very noticeable in Europe for me was the fact that I did not get charged extra for anything that was gluten free," Kao said. "In America, if I go to a restaurant and it has a gluten-free bread option or a gluten -ree bun option, they charge me $1 to $2 extra, which is really annoying, and it does add up."
Even in Italy, Kao found restaurants to be very conscientious of dietary needs.
"Everybody was so conscious, conscious that there were (gluten-free) options," she added. "I didn't even have to ask for it, and if I did have to ask for it, they were like, 'Oh my gosh. Let me show you. We have all of these options.'”
Need for stricter regulation
Eldh’s health journey has made her passionate about what is put into her food, which compelled her to start her own health food brand, The Muffin Drop.
Originally from England, Eldh was frustrated with a lot of the lower standards allowed for food quality in the United States, such as allowing Genetically Modified Organisms, which is food that has had its DNA modified in a lab to produce certain traits.
Eldh pointed out that food in England is much more "true to source" because it has been better regulated.
"You're like, ‘Okay, well, then why does the U.S. have all this junk in it?’" she said. "And it is because it's so unregulated here. It's basically a lawless land when it comes to food.”
Like Eldh, Duncan agrees there needs to be stricter regulations in the United States.
“Absolutely, there's so many additives that are banned in Europe that we have and are legal," she said. "So I definitely think we should place more restrictions on the food, like the chemical, yellow number five definitely.”
Yellow number five is a controversial synthetic food dye that is suspected of causing many negative health effects, and some research has found it to be a carcinogen.
Despite these findings and long-term health risks, as well as yellow number five being banned in many other countries, it is not banned by the FDA in the United States because it does not pose an immediate risk to one’s health.
“If we can spend hundreds of billions of dollars or trillions of dollars on defense, one would have to believe we could grow a lot more organic food and feed our people in a more healthy way, and have better regulations around this,” Davis said. “Politicians just don't prioritize it.”
Solutions to a healthier lifestyle
Until regulations are put in place, it is imperative we do our best to protect our health.
This means consuming foods that are not processed and/or exposed to dangerous chemicals.
After years of trial and error, Eldh made exceptional changes to her diet and learned the best ways to take care of her body.
“My sort of rule was, if you can't pronounce it, then you shouldn't really be eating it,” she said. “And so that, in itself, was one of the biggest healing things that I was able to do for myself.”
These hard-to-pronounce ingredients on food labels and in pre-packaged foods can be easily avoided by consuming whole, natural foods.
“(Eat) more fruits and vegetables, smaller portions of meat, more legumes, you know, more like beans and nuts that have healthy fats and more fish, you know that comes from local sources, preferably rather than frozen,” explained Davis.
Simplicity is the best option.
“I think just going back to the basics of the macronutrients, which is going to be your protein, fats and carbohydrates, but then going deeper than that, it's just like finding whole protein sources,” suggests Pond.
Although we live in a fast-paced society that enjoys convenience and quick meals, cooking and seeing what exactly goes into your food plays a significant role in protecting your health, as recommended by Pond.
“I would say kind of transitioning out of that fast food mindset and shifting more into homemade or more localized food,” she added.
This effort pays off in the long run and will allow you to feel your best.
“I feel so different when I don't eat processed food,” says Skylar. “It changes your mood. It changes just everything, like your energy.”
Although Eldh faced countless visits to the doctor and a long list of debilitating symptoms, she is a representation of hope for everyone else facing the same trials.
“After doing, you know, so much removal of foods and a bunch of different practices, I claim that I'm healed, which is amazing, because, you know, they tell you you're not going to heal,” she said. “But I think that the core to this business now is proving to people that you can.”
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