On September 7, 2023, Inserm published a press release regarding the publication in the BMJ on the association between emulsifying food additives and the risk of cardiovascular diseases.
This study was carried out by researchers from CRESS, and analyzed the health data of 95,442 adults participating in the French NutriNet-Santé cohort and their overall consumption of food emulsifiers.
The article states that “emulsifiers are among the most commonly used additives in industrial foods. They are often added to processed and packaged foods.”
Furthermore, “French researchers have evaluate the links between exposure to emulsifiers and the risk of cardiovascular diseases, including coronary heart disease and cerebrovascular diseases, that is to say pathologies affecting the circulation blood and blood vessels in the heart and brain”.
The results, fruit of years of research and taking into account known risk factors for heart disease, show higher intakes of food additives corresponding to codes E460 to E468 were associated with higher risks of disease. cardiovascular. This association was particularly observable for the additives E460 and E466.
On the other hand, the additives E471 and E472 are associated with higher risks for all the pathologies studied. Risks of cardiovascular disease, cerebrovascular disease and coronary heart disease have also been observed with the additives E472b, E472c and E339.
This research has some limitations, as the news article suggests it, however:
“If these results are to be replicated in other studies around the world, they bring key new knowledge to the debate on the re-evaluation of regulations relating to the use of additives in the food industry, in order to better protect consumers », Explain Mathilde Touvier and Bernard Srour, main authors of the study.
