Hazards of dyes and artificial ingredients in "pretty food"

Your taste buds help you decide if a food tastes good, but your eyes help you decide whether to eat it or not. However, many of these foods include artificial ingredients to make them look pretty.

No. In fact, recent research refreshes concerns that artificial dyes added to foods and drinks may cause or worsen hyperactivity.

• Food manufacturers make their wares more appetizing by adding food colouring, often relying on synthetic dyes to do the job.
• Over the years, critics have charged that artificial colourings cause health problems, especially behaviour disorders in children.
• In the 1970s, pediatrician Benjamin Feingold, MD, introduced a theory that gave hope to parents of hyperactive children:  eliminating certain food ingredients and additives -- including artificial colourings -- from their kids' diets, could reduce unruly behaviour and improve concentration.
• Most mainstream physicians rejected Dr. Feingold's theory, arguing that diet does not influence the condition now known as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). However, recent research suggests that cutting back on artificial colourings just may make kids less restless and more focussed after all.
• Doctors at Columbia University analyzed 15 studies in which parents and teachers rated children's behaviour before and after the youngsters consumed artificially coloured drinks and foods.
• They estimated that eliminating these products improved conduct and concentration about one-third to one-half as effectively as ADHD medications.
• More study is needed, but feeding kids fewer foods with added colouring can't hurt and may help keep order in the house and classroom.

No. Some natural dyes come from surprising sources that may, in rare cases, cause allergic reactions.

• It may bug you to learn that your raspberry yogurt or pink lemonade could contain a dye made from insects — beetles, to be precise.
• A variety of foods and beverages get their brilliant colours from red dyes called carmine and cochineal, which are made from ground-up cochineal beetles.
• Vegetarians and people who follow a kosher diet often react with anger upon learning that they have unwittingly consumed insect parts. At least they don't break out in hives or struggle to breathe, which is what happens to a small number of people who are allergic to these dyes. Some develop full-blown anaphylactic shock.
• Many people don't discover that they are allergic to carmine and cochineal colourings until they have a bad reaction. Unfortunately, these dyes aren't always clearly identified on product ingredient lists.
• However, a growing number of manufacturers list carmine and cochineal by name, while others have stopped using them altogether.

In the most basic sense, artificial colourings and dyes in food is just a bad idea all around. Whenever possible, avoid these products and choose something that may look less enticing, but is probably more natural than the alternative.