Coming to Terms With Labels : Food packaging claims can mean everything but what they should. That’s why pressure for change has been mounting.

It seems just about all of us have taken another look at our eating habits since the American Heart Assn. recommended that fat should account for only 30% of our daily calorie intake.

As diet-conscious Americans replace their calorie calculators with pencils and their own good memories, they find themselves pushing their grocery carts into a war zone of food-label claims.

The dispute was sparked by advertising ploys some dietitians called “white-lie labeling”--marketing gimmicks that critics claim use the words light, reduced or lean to seduce shoppers to buy their products.

Terms such as light, lite, lean, leaner and lower-fat don’t always point to low-fat foods, prompting a consideration of dramatic changes in the terms labels may use, in accordance with the 1990 Nutrition Education and Labeling Act.

Angry consumer groups and the 61,000-member American Dietetic Assn. have put pressure on the Food and Drug Administration to pinpoint the definitions for those labels and make them less confusing, according to ADA spokeswoman Kathleen Zelman.

As it stands now, light could mean anything from lighter in texture, lower in calorie content or paler in content--the term could have nothing to do with the amount of fat in the product.

The Chicago-based American Dietetic Assn. and several consumer groups, through lobbying efforts and a close working relationship with FDA Commissioner Dr. David Kessler, vow to force a healthy change into American supermarkets next year.

The new food labels, expected on the shelves in the spring of 1993, are said to be not only more specific in terms of ingredients, but also to do a better job of defining the terms light, reduced fat, low-fat and lean, Zelman said. FDA regulations currently make few restrictions on labels with these descriptions, she said.

“With these changes, the manufacturers will not be able to use marketing ploys to trick people into buying their products,” Zelman said.

Still, the battle is by no means over. Just when all sides seemed close to a peace treaty, consumer advocates accused the FDA of slipping in alterations. The changes, added to the FDA’s proposal two weeks before the deadline for public comment, significantly weaken label requirements for using the words less and reduced in regard to calories, fat, cholesterol or sodium in all food products.

The new language allows less fat and reduced fat to be used interchangeably, and it also allows a product labeled reduced to have a greater proportion of its calories from fat, according to Sharon Lindan, assistant director of Legal Affairs for the Center for Science in the Public Interest in Washington, D.C.

“It is a war of sorts,” Lindan said of the situation. “We have a number of problems with (the amended proposal) . . . . They snuck it in at the 11th hour without people being able to comment on it.”

She said the alterations, directed by the federal Office of Management and Budget, surprised many of those who attended a hearing in Washington in late January.

Lindan said representatives of the food industry who were at that hearing requested an across-the-board delay in the food labeling changes that was not granted. The 1990 proposal allows delays of up to one year, granted on a case-by-case basis, she added.

Some registered dietitians who have been following the dispute with more interest than involvement say they may not be sure what the new labels will say until they actually see them on the grocery shelves. “Don’t hold your breath,” said Pat Trent, an outpatient dietitian at Hoag Hospital. “You never know.”

The average consumer has been so confused by labeling lingo, Trent said, that a team of dietitians at the Newport Beach hospital started a class called “Supermarket Sleuths: Discovering What Labels Really Mean.”

In them, cardiac dietitian Carole Tanner conducts a supermarket tour in which labels are decoded and people are advised how to “buy smart and eat healthy.”

One doesn’t necessarily need to be fluent in label language, just educated, Trent says.

“You have to be well-informed, because what we’re avoiding now is total fat,” Trent said.

She added that just because pasta has no fat doesn’t mean the serious dieter can have eight piles of spaghetti a day and still shed unwanted pounds.

“You have to watch everything if you don’t want to gain weight,” she said.

Darla Miller, a registered dietitian at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, says the key to a successful relationship with the low-fat diet is to tally fat grams. (One gram of fat is equivalent to 9 calories.)

She tells people “that five grams of fat is the equivalent of a teaspoon of hidden fat or a pat of butter.” She added that when a dieter spies a healthful-looking bran muffin in the bakery, what should be considered are the 15 grams of fat in it and the three pats of butter on top.

With the change in emphasis, if you feel like an old dieter trying to learn new tricks, supporters of the low-fat lifestyle say, you’re probably a quicker study than you think.

“I was scared because it was a new way of thinking,” said Cindy Smith of Newport Beach. “But it’s much easier to keep track of fat than caloric intake. You can even cheat a little and as long as you keep watching your fat, you’re still on your diet.”

Those who watch their fat intake maintain that they don’t feel hungry and that they can actually eat more of some of their favorite foods.

Smith said she went into private consultation in mid-September with Leslie Eckerling of UCI’s Weight Management Program after a string of diets had her on the familiar roller-coaster ride of lose and regain.

Now 45 pounds leaner, Smith’s a believer in low-fat eating.

“Through all of this . . , I’ve never felt better,” she said. “It’s a great concept.”

Some converts were not quite so willing, however.

For 33-year-old Dave Reynolds, a skyrocketing cholesterol level forced him to go on a hospital-supervised low-fat diet. When his cholesterol level reached 230, he found himself counting fat grams in Miller’s office at Western Medical Center in Santa Ana.

“She said she’d seen heart patients with lower cholesterol,” said Reynolds, an El Toro engineering technician who has since lost 20 pounds.

“I told her I will not count calories . . , it’s a waste of my time,” Reynolds said. “By the time you count them, you burn them all off anyway.”

Reynolds said he agrees that some labels are attempts to trick the well-intentioned dieter. Now an informed consumer, he is no longer fooled.

“I don’t really find it a problem, but what I feel is unfair is when they call it low-cholesterol, because fat is fat,” he said.

Trent says that because body image is different here in the land of bikinis and spa cuisine, the low-fat emphasis has been easily embraced in Southern California. But changing the diet patterns of people in other places might prove to be a tougher sell.

“In the Midwest and Southeastern parts of the country, they eat a lot of fat--they fry everything,” Trent said. “It’s going to take a long time.”

Tips for a Healthier Diet

Nutrition and ingredient labeling are two valuable sources of information that can help you make wise food choices.

Guidelines for Health

* Limit fat intake to 30% of calories or less.

* Reduce dietary cholesterol to 300 mg or less.

* Limit sodium intake, especially from added salt and processed foods.

* Reduce intake of simple sugars (sugar, honey, fruit juices).

* Increase intake of complex carbohydrates and fiber (whole grain breads and cereals, fresh fruits, and vegetables such as dried beans and peas).

Daily Fat Allowances

The amount of fat you need depends upon the number of calories you consume. Here is a simple way to determine calorie needs:

Sedentary: 13 kilocalories (kcal) multiplied by weight in pounds

Moderately active: 15 kcal multiplied by weight in pounds

Very active: 17 kcal multiplied by weight in pounds

To lose approximately one pound per week, subtract 500 calories per day. (Example: 13 kcal multiplied by 125 pounds equals 1,625 kcal/day.)

Daily Maximum Maximum calorie grams of teaspoons of intake fat per day fat per day 1,200 40 8 1,500 50 10 1,800 60 12 2,000 67 13 1/2 2,400 80 16 2,700 90 18

How To Calculate the Percentage of Calories from Fat

1. Check the label for the grams of fat in a serving.

2. Multiply the grams of fat by 9 (number of calories in 1 gram of fat) to get the number of calories from fat.

3. Divide the calories from fat by the total calories per serving as listed on the label. The answer will be a decimal.

4. Multiply the result in Step 3 by 100 to get the percentage of calories from fat.

Example:

Best Foods Light Reduced Calorie Mayonnaise

Step 1: 5 grams of fat per serving

Step 2: 5 x 9 equals 45 calories from fat

Step 3: 45 divided by the total calories per serving (50) equals 0.90

Step 4: 0.90 x 100 equals 90% calories from fat

Best Foods Real Mayonnaise:

Step 1: 11 grams of fat per serving

Step 2: 11 x 9 equals 99 calories from fat

Step 3: 99 divided by the total calories per serving (100) equals 0.99

Step 4: 0.99 x 100 equals 99% calories from fat

What it means: This simple test shows that although Best Foods Light Reduced Calorie Mayonnaise advertises to have half the fat and calories of regular mayonnaise, that claim is based on the percentage of fat by weight (fat doesn’t weigh much). The concern should be the percentage of calories from fat, in this case 90%, triple the recommended amount.

Descriptive Label Terms

According to FDA regulations, when you see these words on a label, this is what they really mean.

* Sodium free: Less than 5 mg (sodium) NA in a serving.

* Very low sodium: 35 mg or less per serving.

* Low sodium: 140 mg or less per serving.

* Reduced sodium: The level of sodium is reduced by at least 75%.

* Unsalted or no salt added: Foods once processed with salt but now produced without it.

* Low calorie: No more than 40 calories per serving.

* Reduced calorie: At least 1/3 lower in calories than a similar food in which calories are not reduced.

* Diet or dietetic: One ingredient must have been reduced, eliminated or substituted for another ingredient. These products now must meet the requirements for low- or reduced-calorie foods or be intended for a special dietary purpose other than weight control, such as “for low-sodium diets.”

Source: Clinical Nutrition Services Staff Hoag Hospital