American Breakfast Cereals Are Becoming Less Healthy, Study Finds

Breakfast cereals, a heavily marketed, highly processed mainstay of the American diet, especially among children, are becoming less healthy, filled with increasing amounts of sugar, fat and sodium, according to a study published Wednesday in the journal JAMA Network Open. The study also found that cereals’ protein and fiber content — nutrients essential for a healthy diet — have been in decline.

The findings, based on an analysis of 1,200 new or reformulated cereal products introduced in the United States between 2010 and 2023, are likely to add fuel to the ongoing debate about the relationship between processed food, mounting childhood obesity and the rising prevalence of chronic diseases.

The debate has gained greater prominence in the months since health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. began using the federal bully pulpit to excoriate ultra-processed foods as part of his “Make America Healthy Again” campaign. Mr. Kennedy, who has declared that “sugar is poison,” last month announced that the Department of Health and Human Services would work to remove some artificial dyes from the U.S. food supply, citing concerns about their impact on children’s health.

Shuoli Zhao, a professor of agricultural economics at the University of Kentucky and a co-author of the new study, said the findings were especially notable given evolving consumer awareness about the links between excess consumption of sugar, salt and saturated fat and chronic conditions like diabetes, hypertension and cancer.

“What’s most surprising to me is that the healthy claims made on the front of these products and the nutritional facts on the back are actually going in the opposite direction,” he said.

The analysis, based on veri gathered by the marketing consultancy Mintel, did not identify brand names, nor did it capture information on purchasing and consumption habits. The vast majority of the 1,200 products it analyzed were relaunches of existing cereals, including so-called reformulations that alter a product’s taste or nutritional content, Professor Zhao said.