A lawsuit described by lawyers as the “first of its kind” alleges that major food companies, including Coca-Cola, Nestlé, and General Mills, intentionally designed their products to be addictive. The lawsuit, filed by a Pennsylvania teenager, argues that the companies draw from the “cigarette playbook.”
Other defendants include PepsiCo, Conagra, Kellanova, Kraft Heinz, Mars, Mondelez International, Post Holdings, and WK Kellogg Co. Each of these companies have products that “dominate the shelves of our grocery stores,” the lawsuit says, including ultra-processed foods (UPF). These foods are “inventions of modern industrial technology and contain little to no whole food.”
When UPFs “exploded” in the 1980s, they were “accompanied by an explosion in obesity, diabetes, and other life-changing chronic illnesses.”
The plaintiff, 18-year-old Bryce Martinez, claims he’s the victim of “predatory profiteering.” The lawsuit states that he was “diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes and Non-Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease at age 16. These diseases did not exist in children prior to Defendants’ conduct.” The diseases are further described as “severe life-changing physical infirmities.”
According to the lawsuit, the defendants’ marketing “targeted children, including Plaintiff, with unfair and deceptive messages regarding their UPF.”
UPF is “inextricably intertwined with Big Tobacco,” the filing states.
“In the 1980s, Big Tobacco took over the American food environment. Phillip Morris bought major US food companies, including General Foods and Kraft. RJ Reynolds purchased Nabisco, Del Monte, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and others,” the suit explains. “Collectively, Phillip Morris and RJ Reynolds dominated the US food system for decades. During this time, they used their cigarette playbook to fill our food environment with addictive substances that are aggressively marketed to children and minorities.”
In other words, UPF strategies were “guided by the same tobacco company scientists and the same kind of brain research on sensory perceptions, physiological psychology, and chemical senses that were used to increase the addictiveness of cigarettes.”
The lawsuit involves claims of negligence, failure to warn, fraudulent misrepresentation, and violation of unfair trade practices and consumer protection law.
One of Martinez’s attorneys, Rene Rocha, said during a news conference, as reported by The Philadelphia Inquirer, that these companies “used the same kind of marketing tactics that they had used to sell cigarettes to children and converted that to sell these types of foods to children as well. And unfortunately, decades later, despite warning after warning, our food environment continues to deteriorate and our children continue to get sicker and sicker.”
The lawsuit has been two years in the making, the outlet noted.
