Big Brother And The Unintended Consequences

Do you load the homeless with transfats or nothing? It’s a sticky issue:

The Health Department’s war on trans fats may have an unintended victim — the city’s food pantries and soup kitchens that feed hungry New Yorkers every day.

Canned meats and beans, jars of peanut butter and other pantry staples donated from around the country include the artery-clogging trans fats.

“We support the ban, but people need to understand this will mean less food in the food pantry,” said Joel Berg, executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger.

During yesterday’s lengthy public hearing, Berg told the Board of Health that any plan to ban food with trans fats should provide extra money for pantries and soup kitchens to buy trans fat-free foods.

“It’s a painful dilemma,” Berg said. “Our folks get less quality or they get less food?”

The debate then turned philosophical:

Health Commissioner Thomas Frieden has asked the board to change the Health Code so that trans fats can no longer be used in city eateries. Another proposal would force some restaurants to post caloric contents of its food on menus.

“Trans fats increase the level of bad cholesterol and reduce the level of good cholesterol and by doing so they increase your risk of heart attack and stroke and early death,” Frieden told reporters during a break in the hearing. “Keeping toxic items out of our food — this is a core role of government.”

Hm. At least one constituency disagreed with that definition of the proper role of government:

Outside the hearing, Luis Nunez, president of the Latino Restaurant Association, with 4,000 member restaurants in the city, said that health officials had not prepared them for the proposed ban on trans fat cooking, and were now threatening them with fines or other penalties.

“This big brother policy does not work,” Mr. Nunez said.