Too much saturated fats and sugars can harm babies development

Research from the Children’s Food Campaign has exposed the low nutritional quality many baby foods sold in major supermarkets have. Researchers found shocking results, including Farley’s Original Rusks contained more sugars than McVities Dark Chocolate Digestives, and Heinz Toddler’s Own Mini Cheese Biscuits had more saturated fat per 100g than a McDonald’s quarter pounder with cheese.

The survey of more than 100 foods marketed for babies and young children also discovered that Cow&Gate Baby Balance Bear Biscuits contained trans fats and were not labelled correctly, and found that only half the products were low in saturated fat, salt and sugar. In the case of Heinz products this figure was just one in four, and for Cow&Gate, one in nine products were high in sugars.

Children’s Food Campaign joint-coordinator Christine Haigh says, “the results of this survey are staggering.  Many foods marketed for babies and young children are often advertised as “healthy”.  In reality, in terms of sugar and saturated fat content, some are worse than junk food.  In particular, failing to correctly label products that contain dangerous trans fats is outrageous.”

The Children’s Food Campaign is now calling on the government to make companies remove transfats, reduce the amount of saturated fat, salt and sugar and develop labelling to enable parents to see at a glance if the food they’re buying for their baby is healthy.