San Francisco sues Coca-Cola, Nestle, Kellogg over ultraprocessed food

San Francisco is suing the makers of ultraprocessed foods, including Kraft Heinz, Coca-Cola, Nestle, Kellogg and Mondelez.

"These companies created a public health crisis with the engineering and marketing of ultraprocessed foods," San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu said.

"They took food and made it unrecognizable and harmful to the human body."

What we know about San Francisco's lawsuit

The lawsuit, lodged in San Francisco Superior Court on Tuesday, accuses 10 corporations of violating California laws on public nuisance and deceptive marketing.

It alleges the manufacturers pushed products they know are harmful with marketing that ignored or obscured the risks — similarly to how tobacco companies operate.

"Just like Big Tobacco, the ultraprocessed food industry targeted children to increase their profits," a statement said.

As ultraprocessed foods have proliferated, rates of obesity, cancer and diabetes have increased, the lawsuit claims.

The city is seeking restitution and civil penalties to offset its healthcare costs.

It also wants a court order prohibiting the companies from engaging in deceptive marketing and requiring them to alter their practices.

It's the first time a US municipality has sued over claims food companies have knowingly marketed addictive and harmful ultraprocessed foods.

What are ultraprocessed foods?

There isn't a commonly agreed-upon definition of ultraprocessed food.

But researchers generally apply the term to mass-produced foods made using industrial processing techniques and chemically modified substances that normally can't be produced in a normal kitchen at home.

Typical ultraprocessed foods include commercially produced breads, frozen pizza, hot dogs, candy, soft drinks, chips, sweetened breakfast cereals and instant soups.

They frequently contain many added ingredients such as fats, sugars or sweeteners, salts and artificial colors or preservatives.

They most likely also contain other industrially produced substances such as thickeners, foaming agents and emulsifiers.

Around 70% of the products sold in US supermarkets are ultraprocessed, and children in the United States get about 60% of their calories from such foods.

"Americans want to avoid ultraprocessed foods, but we are inundated by them. These companies engineered a public health crisis, they profited handsomely, and now they need to take responsibility for the harm they have caused," Chiu said.

What are the health issues linked to ultraprocessed food?

A three-part series published in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet in November blamed ultraprocessed foods for an increase in multiple diseases from obesity to cancer.

Other studies tie the consumption of more ultraprocessed foods with early death or higher risks of cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease and cerebrovascular disease. 

According to the US Centers for Disease Control, 40% of Americans are obese.

Almost 16% have diabetes, a condition that can result from being excessively overweight.

How has the food industry responded to San Francisco's lawsuit?

Sarah Gallo of the Consumer Brands Association, a trade group representing many of the companies targeted in the suit, said "there is currently no agreed upon scientific definition of ultraprocessed foods."

"Attempting to classify foods as unhealthy simply because they are processed, or demonizing food by ignoring its full nutrient content, misleads consumers and exacerbates health disparities," she said in a statement.