{"id":328913,"date":"2025-12-03T23:30:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T23:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/328913\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T23:30:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T23:30:12","slug":"san-francisco-sues-coca-cola-nestle-and-others-over-ultraprocessed-foods","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/328913\/","title":{"rendered":"San Francisco sues Coca-Cola, Nestle and others over ultraprocessed foods"},"content":{"rendered":"

The city of San Francisco filed a lawsuit against some of the nation\u2019s top food manufacturers on Tuesday, arguing that ultraprocessed food from the likes of Coca-Cola and Nestle are responsible for a public health crisis.<\/p>\n

City Attorney David Chiu named 10 companies in the lawsuit, including the makers of such popular foods as Oreo cookies, Sour Patch Kids, Kit Kat, Cheerios and Lunchables. The lawsuit argues that ultraprocessed foods are linked to diseases such as Type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease and cancer.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey took food and made it unrecognizable and harmful to the human body,\u201d Chiu said in a news release. \u201cThese companies engineered a public health crisis, they profited handsomely, and now they need to take responsibility for the harm they have caused.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultraprocessed foods include candy, chips, processed meats, sodas, energy drinks, breakfast cereals and other foods that are designed to \u201cstimulate cravings and encourage overconsumption,\u201d Chiu\u2019s office said in the release. Such foods are \u201cformulations of often chemically manipulated cheap ingredients with little if any whole food added,\u201d Chiu wrote in the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

The other companies named in the lawsuit are PepsiCo; Kraft Heinz Company; Post Holdings; Mondelez International; General Mills; Kellogg; Mars Incorporated; and ConAgra Brands.<\/p>\n

None of the companies named in the suit immediately responded to emailed requests for comment.<\/p>\n

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The Consumer Brands Association, a trade group that represents many food manufacturers, said companies adhere to the safety standards established by the Food and Drug Administration.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is currently no agreed upon scientific definition of ultra-processed foods and attempting to classify foods as unhealthy simply because they are processed, or demonizing food by ignoring its full nutrient content, misleads consumers and exacerbates health disparities,\u201d Sarah Gallo, senior vice president of product policy for the group, said in a statement.<\/p>\n

U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has been vocal about the negative impact of ultraprocessed foods and their links to chronic disease and has targeted them in his Make America Healthy Again<\/a> campaign. Kennedy has pushed to ban such foods from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for low-income families.<\/p>\n

An August report<\/a> by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that most Americans get more than half their calories from ultraprocessed foods.<\/p>\n

In October, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a first-in-the-nation law<\/a> to phase out certain ultraprocessed foods from school meals over the next decade.<\/p>\n

San Francisco\u2019s lawsuit cites several scientific studies on the negative impact of ultraprocessed foods on human health.<\/p>\n

\u201cMounting research now links these products to serious diseases\u2014including Type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease, heart disease, colorectal cancer, and even depression at younger ages,\u201d University of California, San Francisco, professor Kim Newell-Green said in the news release.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit argues that by producing and promoting ultraprocessed foods, the companies violate California\u2019s Unfair Competition Law and public nuisance statute. It seeks a court order preventing the companies from \u201cdeceptive marketing\u201d and requiring them to take actions such as consumer education on the health risks of ultraprocessed foods and limiting advertising and marketing of ultraprocessed foods to children. <\/p>\n

It also asks for financial penalties to help local governments with health care costs caused by the consumption of ultraprocessed foods.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The city of San Francisco filed a lawsuit against some of the nation\u2019s top food manufacturers on Tuesday,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":328914,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[28,2356,687,113078,167096,985,25184,2013,3934,793,97,2601,304,851,3932,167097,152186,9647,81297,26791,11160,167099,5599,788,5284,167098,25183,795],"class_list":["post-328913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-california","tag-cancer","tag-conagra-brands","tag-david-chiu","tag-diabetes","tag-food-and-beverage-manufacturing","tag-gavin-newsom","tag-general-mills","tag-general-news","tag-health","tag-health-care-industry","tag-healthy-eating","tag-inc","tag-kellanova","tag-kim-newell-green","tag-local-news-for-apple","tag-marketing-and-advertising","tag-mondelez-international","tag-nestl-sa","tag-pepsico","tag-post-holdings","tag-public-health","tag-robert-f-kennedy-jr","tag-san-francisco","tag-sarah-gallo","tag-the-coca-cola-co","tag-u-s-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/328914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}