For a while I have been wanting to blog about this forever frustrating topic of advertising of foods that they market as healthy. I bore my husband with my incessant comments about how “That is not healthy!” or “That is a lie!” or “Oh yeah right, of course it does!” and more variations on a theme. I seem to rant so much about this topic I thought it would be best to get it all out of my system on here instead! So…which adverts spring to mind when I am talking about what I believe to be essentially false advertising! First I think of Nutella and something along the lines of “Wake up to Nutella, slow release energy for the day!” What a load of rubbish! All that refined sugar is going to really set you up for the day isn’t it!? The next one I think of is the Weetabix breakfast drink which promises it fuels your day with all the protein, energy and fibre you get from a bowl of Weetabix with milk, but neither of these are a good start to your day, as neither contain much protein at all. Another is Belvita biscuits. “Are the perfect source of nutritious and sustained energy” These biscuits are hardly sustained energy with no protein and loads of refined sugar and I would like to argue that they are not that nutritious, even if they contain oats! What about all the other ingredients? They claim to sustain you for 4 hours, I doubt that is the case! Also adding some synthetic vitamins that your body doesn’t absorb won’t make them any more healthy! Why not just eat a bowl of oats? So… how about Flora proactive? It is not hydrogenated and it contains plant sterols, so it must be okay right?! Well at the end of the day it was still made with fats that are inflammatory and it is synthetic, as it was produced in factory, so how is it really better for you than butter, which is pure butter and nothing else! Why not just eat sterols that are found naturally in plant based foods? There are so many adverts out there I could go on and on and on, but you would get bored of reading after a while! To sum up a few more companies that are a little economical with the truth, these ones come to mind: Actimel, Yakult, Benecol, Quorn, some of which think if they get their product endorsed by a celebrity it will make the public trust it is more healthy, but sadly it is not. Next time you watch an advert that is promoting the next health food/drink take it with a massive pinch of unrefined Himalayn salt…because of course table salt is not good for you either and incidentally a lot of these so called health food/drinks contain table salt as well!
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