Top 7 Foods Disguised As Healthy - Learn the Truth Behind So-Called Healthy Food Items

Top 7 Foods Disguised As Healthy - Learn the Truth Behind So-Called Healthy Food Items
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“Healthy” Foods That Are Bad For Your Health

Thanks to ingenious marketing campaigns, some foods have been masquerading as healthy, when in fact, these “healthy foods” are anything but. The following “healthy foods” should be stricken from your healthy foods list:

Soy. Research touting soy’s health benefits is funded by soy companies. But unfermented soy, the kind used for soy burgers, soymilk, soy munchies, soy this, soy that, offers a host of potential problems. The Mayo Clinic website ranks soy as a leading food allergen. If that seems benign, consider that soy, with its highly touted phytoestrogens, can create hormonal imbalances in both women and men – possibly stimulating breast tissue growth in women, and increasing circulating estrogen levels in men.

Men who routinely ate unfermented soy had much lower sperm counts than men who avoided soy, according to a study published in Reproduction (2008). While Asians eat fermented, whole, pure soy (as a condiment), Americans gulp down highly processed soy versions of common foods in much larger quantities. The American Heart Association, in 2008, rescinded its endorsement of soy as a heart-healthy food.

Cereal. What a marketing extravaganza this is! Add vitamins and minerals to a highly processed product, and that automatically makes it a healthy food! The manufacturing process of cereal results in relatively high levels of a cancer-causing substance, acrylamide. This chemical is toxic, according to a study published in Food Additives and Contaminants (2007), and the more processed and refined a cereal, the higher the levels. Many cereals also have added sugar and other additives.

Sunny D. This “bottled sunshine” (sounds healthy, right? Clever marketing strikes again!) is, essentially, liquid candy with vitamin C thrown in. Sunny D, which contains 2 percent or less real fruit juice, also contains: Yellow #5, Yellow #6, corn syrup, sodium benzoate (a preservative) and sodium hexametaphosphate. This tongue twister is also found in detergents!

Luncheon meats. A certain maker of luncheon meats that uses cute kids in their ads, boasts that their luncheon meats contain fewer calories and less fat than a PB & J sandwich. They conveniently leave out mention of the sodium nitrite, a carcinogenic preservative, and the fact that though their foods are lower in (total grams) fat than peanut butter, they are also lower in “healthy” fats and higher in “bad” fats than peanut butter!

“Performance nutrition” protein shakes/bars/cookies. Man did not evolve on “scientifically engineered” protein powders and meal replacement bars. Read the ingredients of this highly processed gunk. You’ll see “natural flavor,” for starters. What’s this? It’s a description of a flavor, not an ingredient! You’ll see artificial sweeteners galore, high fructose corn syrup, preservatives and “artificial flavor.” This hardly sounds like healthy food for athletes or even couch potatoes.

Bagels. White, that is. White flour is a processed simple carbohydrate which could result in a blood sugar rise, which can then increase levels of insulin, a hormone that promotes fat-storing and inflammation. Most brands of any kind of bagels have preservatives.

“Sports” drinks. Here are typical ingredients of this so-called healthy beverage: Yellow #10, high fructose corn syrup, brominated vegetable oil, and oil of wood rosin. Ugh, doesn’t sound healthy, does it? While bromine displaces iodine, thereby potentially impeding healthy thyroid function, high fructose corn syrup is a refined simple carbohydrate that the body does not need.

This post is part of the series: Unhealthy “Health” Foods

Just because something is advertised as being healthy, doesn’t necessarily mean that it is. In this article series, we’ll look at several different foods that are presented as healthy when, in fact, they are actually not.

  1. 7 Unhealthy Foods Disguised as Healthy
  2. Unhealthy Foods Labeled as Healthy