Does zero mean zero? Not always with trans fats

Reported by:Cynthia Newsome
Email: newsome@nbcactionnews.com

TAMPA, FL -- Registered Dieticain Chrissy Barth says trans fats are the worst types of fats.

“I think anything artificial, especially in large quantities, is poison to our bodies,” Barth says.

It’s easy these days to find foods boasting zero trans fats. But buyer beware, what’s on the label can be deceiving.

Turn any food product over and check the ingredients list, and there you’ll likely find ingredients like partially hydrogenated soybean oil that have trans fats.

Barth tells her clients to read the ingredients - not just the labels.

But the box advertises zero grams on the front and it even says zero on the nutrition label. How can that be?

The American Heart Association explains that trans fats or trans fatty acids are created in an industrial process that adds hydrogen to liquid vegetable oils to make them more solid. Partially hydrogenated oil is just another name for trans fats. Restaurants and food processors use trans fats because they are inexpensive and provide a desirable taste and texture to food. Plus, in commercial fryers can be used over and over again.

So why does zero not mean zero? The answer is simply legal loopholes.

While the Food and Drug Administration demanded trans fats be listed, there are three rules that allow manufacturers to hide them.

1) Food makers can round down measurements by .5 increments.

2) The FDA allows their measurements on a nutrition label to be off by 20 percent. Here's a hypothetical example. Let's say there is .6 grams of trans fat per serving. They can say it is .48, which is 20 percent less and still be in compliance.

3) If the total is less than .5, they are allowed to write 'zero'!

Experts say that's not good for us because trans fats provide a double whammy.They raise bad cholesterol and lower good cholesterol. Research into trans fats began in the 1990’s. Before then, very little was known about the adverse health effects.