Nutritional Nightmare

Hello readers! It’s your Civic Pulse CFO and Co-Founder Athanasios Theodorou. After a trip to New York for the holidays, I decided to provide you with a real taste of American culture, politics and media, as well as health, busting or confirming myths, noticing new trends and acting as the first regional correspondent for the Pulse, at least in theory. Today, we’re going to be diving into sweeteners and artificial dyes for our close-up with American food health but also how the fight against overly-processed foods is progressing. Let’s get into it!

On my first day in the Big Apple, the number of halal carts, the traditional New York food stands that seem like tourist traps at first but feel like genuine connection once you approach, was overwhelming. Naturally, I stopped at one of these carts to grab one of the most American snacks imaginable: a corn dog, the delicious sausage treat wrapped in dough and put on a stick. That was the first time that I began to notice the strangest phenomenon about soft drinks…they were a different colour than here in Europe, a bright neon of their normal colour to be exact! Naturally, I thought to myself that I was just seeing things, it was only natural to be biased after hearing so many different stories about unhealthy eating and artificial dyes in the US, I’d become accustomed to seeing foods here as more unhealthy. But once I picked up the orange-flavoured sugary drink and started drinking, it became quite apparent that it was far more sugary than I’d initially expected. “What’d they put in this, an ocean’s worth of sweeteners?” asked a friend that had gotten the same drink. We laughed awkwardly but I couldn’t get my mind off of it.

So, in the spirit of journalism and for the sake of writing an article worth reading, I initiated an investigation as thorough as a halal cart’s owner’s attempt to figure out which country you are from. I tried many different foods and flavours in New York. The machine ice cream was a bit off, too tasty to what I’m used to. The sour sweets we got from the super market were simply…overwhelming. The cereal from the hotel’s buffet was overly sweet, I gagged as I tasted them, yet smiled, as I knew that I had proven my point by then. If you could ignore the destruction of your taste buds, it was the most wonderful feeling. 

I immediately started checking the nutritional information of every single snack and drink I could get my hands one, the evidence was damning. Our sour sweets had 60 grams of sugar per serving, that being 7 pieces, with at least 200 pieces within the package. I must admit that I was mortified by this discovery and its implications about what I’ve been feeding my body since day 1 in the city. The reports about excessive use of artificial dyes and sweeteners were, in fact, never overexaggerated, they were simply the truth!

Fortunately enough, there is still hope about change in the food health sector. In April 2025, the United States Food and Drug Administration set plans in motion to phase out petroleum-based synthetic dyes, such as the infamous Red No. 40, a most important step towards securing a healthier America and part of the larger “Make America Healthy Again” initiative by the Trump administration. 

It’s really important to see international regulation being harmonised, as the European Union had long restricted certain synthetic food dyes, while requiring warning labels with side effects for others, and the US finally following the European example is something that I was very happy reading about in the news back in April. It really goes to show that, beyond all the technical talk and the horrifying news that are projected to us everyday in the news, there is progress that is being made towards a healthier society, more sustainable practices or just less artificial dyes in my orangeade! However, one of the main reasons that I wrote this article is to understand myself and try to showcase if the change that is being made is actually tangible, something that can be understood and felt by the average person, the average tourist for example.

Well then, is it? The answer is unfortunately no. Again, travelling to the US as a European, things will certainly feel different, you can not avoid that. Your casual soft drink will seem more fluorescent and your cereal way more sugary…but is that necessarily a bad thing? If there’s no progress to be made in a field, what are we journalists to write about? Our main purpose is to report the truth, maybe with a spark of our opinion, as we do in the Pulse, seek accountability and demand for change to be made, aiming for a more educated and active international community. 

Anyway, let’s not get too technical about it. Change is actually happening but, as all things, it will require time. After all, the Trump administration had vowed to phase out these synthetic dyes by the end of 2026, not 2025. I like to consider my trip, as well as this article, a preliminary round to a much larger investigation. If I travel back to the states in, say, 3 years, will things have changed? Will European standards match American ones on food health? Only time will tell but I’ll be here to report on it.

Hello again readers! I believe that you can tell that this was a new, different kind of article. We would be really interested in knowing if you liked it! We have never really had a traditional regional correspondent, as our team’s size would not allow for that, but acting as one while on a trip has been really interesting! We of course hope that the article my efforts have produced has been interesting for you too. You can always submit your feedback in the official Civic Pulse email, info@civicpulsejournal.com, or contact me directly through thanos.theodorou.cfo@civicpulsejournal.com. I’d be happy to hear YOUR opinion!