The Food and Drug Administration announced Thursday that it will take steps to remove artificial trans fats from the food supply with a preliminary determination because they are no longer "generally recognized as safe."
According to NBC News, trans fats, the artery-clogging ingredient found in crackers, cookies, pizza and many other baked goods, the government agency said, are considered harmful because they increase risks for heart disease by both raising bad cholesterol levels and lowering good cholesterol.
The proposal stated the new move will attack the health risks associated with the consumption of trans fat. Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said the move could prevent 20,000 heart attacks a year and 7,000 deaths.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 5,000 Americans a year die of heart disease because artificial trans fat is in the food supply "and another 15,000 will get heart disease," due to it, said Thomas Frieden, CDC director
Hamburg said that while the amount of trans fats in the country's diet has declined dramatically in the last decade, they "remain an area of significant public health concern." The trans fats have long been criticized by nutritionists, and New York and other local governments have banned them.
New York City banned trans fats from restaurants in 2007. In 2006, the FDA began requiring food manufacturers to include trans fats on nutritional labels.
"While consumption of potentially harmful artificial trans fat has declined over the last two decades in the United States, current intake remains a significant public health concern," FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said in a press release. "The FDA's action today is an important step toward protecting more Americans from the potential dangers of trans fat. Further reduction in the amount of trans fat in the American diet could prevent an additional 20,000 heart attacks and 7,000 deaths from heart disease each year - a critical step in the protection of Americans' health."
The New York Times reported that under the proposal, which is open for public comment for 60 days, the agency would declare that the source of trans fat, partially hydrogenated oils, were unsafe. Companies would have to prove scientifically that partially hydrogenated oils are safe to eat. The Institute of Medicine has concluded that there is no safe level for consumption of artificial trans fats.
"That will make it a challenge, to be honest," said Michael R. Taylor, deputy commissioner for foods at the F.D.A.
The FDA has previously estimated that the average American eats 4.7 pounds of trans fats a year. The American Heart Association recommends that people should consume fewer than 2 grams of trans fats a day.
According to NBC's diet and nutrition editor, Madelyn Fernstrom, food manufacturers began adding artificial trans fatty acids, or partially hydrogenated oils, to products decades ago because they were seen as a healthier substitute than saturated fats such butter and were an economical way to maintain food texture and flavor.
However, according to USA Today, numerous studies have also shown that consumption of trans fat can have "lots of adverse health events, including increasing LDL cholesterol and decreasing HDL, or good cholesterol," said Penny Kris-Etherton, a professor of nutrition at Penn State University in University Park, Penn.
Foods containing unapproved food additives are considered adulterated under U.S. law, meaning they cannot legally be sold, the FDA said in a release.
Though they have been removed from many items, the fats are still found in processed foods, including some microwave popcorns and frozen pizzas, refrigerated doughs and ready-to-use frostings. They are also sometimes used by restaurants that use the fats for frying. Many larger chains have phased them out, but smaller restaurants may still get trans fats from suppliers.
If the preliminary determination is finalized, according to the FDA, then partially hydrogenated oils will become food additives subject to premarket FDA approval. Foods with unapproved additives cannot legally be sold.
The advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest first petitioned FDA to ban trans fats nine years ago. The group's director, Michael Jacobson, says the move is "one of the most important lifesaving actions the FDA could take."
He says the agency should try and move quickly as it determines a timeline.
"Six months or a year should be more than enough time, especially considering that companies have had a decade to figure out what to do," Jacobson said.
