We have all lately heard a lot about MAHA (Make America Healthy Again) from Robert F Kennedy Jr. Some of the things he is advocating probably would improve the health of Americans, but many would not only not improve health, but would make it worse. In this post I’m going to try to identify the good parts and debunk the rest.
Food Dyes
Kennedy wants to eliminate “synthetic” food dyes except for “natural” ones. Food dyes have no nutritional value and many have never been adequately tested in humans. That does not mean they are toxic or cause disease. The only food dye that has been shown to be possibly toxic to humans is red dye #3 also known as erythrosine. It has already been banned in food and cosmetics. For other food dyes we simply do not know how safe they are for human consumption. . The FDA has recently approved 3 plant based food dyes:
- Galdieria extract blue, a blue color derived from the unicellular red algae Galdieria sulphuraria.
- Butterfly pea flower extract, a blue color that can be used to achieve a range of shades including bright blues, intense purple, and natural greens. This dye is produced through the water extraction of the dried flower petals of the butterfly pea plant
- Calcium phosphate, a white color approved for use in ready-to-eat chicken products, white candy melts, doughnut sugar, and sugar for coated candies.
We don’t know any more about the safety of long term use of these plant-based dyes in food than we know about synthetic dyes. Just because they are extracted from plants does not make them safer. The drug digoxin was originally extracted from the foxglove plant. Taking too much of that can kill you. The most conservative thing to do is to ban food dyes, period. That would take congressional action, which is most unlikely in the current congress.
There is no evidence, by the way, that any currently used food dyes cause cancer or other diseases. There is just very little evidence about whether they are safe or not.
Emulsifiers
Emulsifiers are added to foods to prevent separation of oil and water in foods. They also can increase shelf life. Some are natural products like guar gum and some are synthetic. Emulsifiers are not new and have been used for hundreds of years. There is some evidence that certain emulsifiers may adversely affect the gut microbiome. Most of this work has been done in mice, so it is not clear whether emulsifiers have the same effect in humans. Emulsifiers are used most extensively in processed and ultra-processed foods. Unprocessed foods do not contain emulsifiers. Once again, the jury is out on whether emulsifiers have adverse effects in humans, but they might have an effect on the gut microbiome and promote inflammation and they might not. Kennedy is opposed to all emulsifiers in food. This is not exactly a nuanced perspective, as is the case with all his recommendations and obsessions.
Other Food Additives
There are hundreds of substances added to foods. Here is a link to an FDA list of all substances added to foods that are approved by the FDA or are GRAS (generally recognized as safe): Substances Added to Food. This list is 80 pages long! I have to say that I agree with Kennedy on this one. Already, all of these additives have to be listed on the contents label. If there are more than three things on the contents label that you don’t recognize, leave it on the shelf!
Seed Oils
Kennedy (who is a lawyer, not a health expert, by the way) parrots many so called “natural” food advocates who say that seed oils have toxic by products and the wrong ration of omega 6 to omega 3 fatty acids. They maintain that seed oils cause inflammation and thus increase the risk of heart disease and other conditions like obesity and diabetes. The evidence does not support these claims.
What are seed oils anyway?
- Canola (rapeseed) oil
- Corn oil
- Cottonseed oil
- Soybean oil
- Sunflower oil
- Safflower oil
- Grapeseed oil
- Rice Bran oil
All of these are polyunsaturated (as opposed to saturated oils like animal fats, palm oil and coconut oil , which are not good for you in more than moderate amounts). They are more refined than cold pressed oils and a chemical process is used in the refining process. These chemicals, including hexane are volatile and completely evaporate during the refining process. There are no toxic by products in refined seed oils.
Health effects of seed oils – The evidence
Seed oils contain linoleic acid which is an omega 6 fatty acid. Multiple studies show that linoleic acid intake decrease the risk of heart disease and decreases , not increases inflammation. The best way to use these or any oil as a beneficial part of a healthy diet is stir frying vegetables, oven roasting fish, or crafting homemade salad dressings.
The correct ration of omega 6 to omega 3 fatty acids is not clear. To get both eat omega 3 fatty acids which are found in high amounts in walnuts and fatty fish. A good summary of the evidence on the good health effects of seed oils can be found on this Massachusetts General website: Seed Oils: Facts and Myths.
Beef Tallow
Kennedy thinks that using beef tallow for frying is healthier than seed oils. While beef tallow does make for delicious french fries, it is 100% saturated fat. Saturated fat can be healthy as a small part of your total fat intake, but eating exclusively animal fat vs unsaturated fat markedly increases the risk of heart disease, obesity and diabetes. Multiple studies over the years have confirmed increased risk from eating exclusively or large quantities of saturated fats. Kennedy has a video of him frying a whole turkey in beef tallow while saying that this is cooking the MAHA way. Here is a link to that video. In my opinion this is the height of irresponsibility.
Water Fluoridation
Kennedy cites studies that show decreased IQ in children who are exposed to fluoridated water. I have a previous post about the safety of water fluoridation. See this link. The bottom line is that these studies were done in countries and locales that had very high natural fluoride levels. There was no effect in these studies on the very low fluoride levels that are used in water supplies to prevent cavities in children. Banning water fluoridation will lead to excess tooth decay in the most vulnerable children.
Limiting foods that can be purchased with SNAP benefits
SNAP stands for Supplemental Food Assistance Program. It used to be called the food stamp program. Benefits are applied to a card that can be used like a credit card to purchase food. As of now households whose gross income is 130% or less of the federal poverty and whose net income is below the federal poverty level are eligible for SNAP benefits. The amount is determined by the number of people in the household. The federal government pays all of the benefits and 50% the administrative costs. The state pays the other half of the administrative costs. The Big Beautiful Bill Act will make substantial cuts to the SNAP program. More about that later.
People can use their SNAP benefits to purchase food, but not alcohol or cigarettes. Texas and Louisiana have just passed laws that also prevent using SNAP benefits to purchase soft drinks or candy. Kennedy has praised these new state laws. While it is true that soft drinks and candy are not healthy foods, excluding these from SNAP benefits is just a way to make lawmakers feel virtuous about limiting the food choices poor people make. It is not going to improve their nutrition because like non-SNAP households foods households buy on SNAP benefits tend to be ultra-processed foods. Healthy unprocessed foods are more expensive and require time to prepare and cook as well as requiring working appliances and cooking equipment. Families at or below the poverty level, who are often renting sub-standard housing are unlikely be able to afford to purchase or to have the time, and equipment to prepare and cook unprocessed foods. Non-SNAP households don’t do much better. See this link from the USDA: Foods typically purchased by SNAP households .One more MAHA recommendation that will likely not improve health!
What makes this even worse are the cuts to the SNAP program in the Big Beautiful Bill Act. Here is a summary of the cuts and when they will kick in:
- Shifting SNAP costs to states by:
- Requiring states to pay a portion of SNAP benefits for the first time in program history, up to 15%, based on their payment error rates, beginning in October 2027. Final negotiations in the Senate resulted in a temporary implementation delay for up to two years for states with high error rates.
- Increasing the state’s share of administrative costs from 50% to 75%.
- Restricting future adjustments to the Thrifty Food Plan, which will include cuts to SNAP benefits as well as benefit levels for The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP), SUN Bucks/Summer EBT benefits, and the Nutrition Assistance Program block-grant to Puerto Rico.
- Increasing the number of individuals subject to time limits on their SNAP benefits, including, for the first time ever, parents of school-aged children over 14 and older adults age 55 through age 64 by expanding work requirements and restricting waivers.
- Adds a time limit on benefits for veterans, currently homeless individuals and former foster care youth.
- Eliminating funding for the SNAP Nutrition Education program.
SNAP is (or was) the most effective hunger relief program in the U.S.
All of the above information on the changes to SNAP benefits comes from the Harvesters Community Food Network .
Vaccines
With no evidence whatever, the MAHA report calls current childhood vaccination schedules “overmedication.” It emphasizes exceedingly rare adverse effects of vaccines and promises to do “randomized trials” of current vaccine schedules. Randomized trials are routinely done before new vaccines are approved and repeating them will be inordinately expensive and delay vaccine approval. The result of this MAHA policy will mean that we will see serious childhood diseases again, some of which will result in hospitalization and some totally avoidable childhood deaths. We have already seen a resurgence of measles cases in 40 states. See my previous post about Vaccine risks in perspective.
Bottom Line
Kennedy has legitimate concerns about the unhealthy ultra-processed foods that most Americans eat. The concerns about food additives are also reasonable but overblown. These legitimate concerns are mixed in with conspiracy theories about toxic byproducts in seed oils, health benefits of beef tallow, and vaccines as a cause of autism. He completely ignores the fact that most poor people cannot afford to buy, prepare or cook healthy unprocessed foods. He is overall a danger to public health.