Artificial

      Lately, artificial flavors and dyes have been attacked as things that need to be banned from junk food, along with a variety of other dubious chemicals.  A worthwhile endeavor to be sure, but I am of the opinion that this is what might be called a one percent problem, wherein the base ingredients of junk food, refined grains and sugar, are far worse bad actors.  Almost by definition junk food cannot be made from remotely healthy ingredients.  

     And no, "whole grain" flours have no more significant health benefits than the cheapest loaf of bread in the market.  This is a 1%/99% situation as well, but in reverse.  In other words whole grain flours are, at best, one percent better than ultra-fine ground white flour in terms of how a human's metabolism processes them.  If you doubt that try eating a couple of slices of groovitational artisanal whole grain sprouted Ezekiel bread, check your glucose level an hour later, then repeat the process with two slices of the bleached chemical foam known as white bread.  You will see a similar glucose spike in both cases, with the whole grain spike taking a minute or two longer, but the spike will be nearly, even exactly, the same.

     The whole grain stuff has more fiber, which accounts for the slight delay in spike compared to the wondrous bread, but metabolically speaking it's a wash.  If one keeps total carbs to five percent of the total, then a piece of bread or two every once in a while is manageable.  Add to that bread three doughnuts, two Ho-Hos, a bagel, a candy bar, a sugar saturated coffee drink, and six Oreos on a regular basis then you are marked for an early painful death.  In France and Italy, for instance, bread consumption is common but not very high.  The diff. is that they include all the other insulin spikers far less often.

     In summation, artificial dyes and flavors are way down the list of bad food actors and are not the proximate cause of the explosion of autoimmune conditions in this country.  Substituting them for "safer" alternatives won't make a dent in the current health crisis.