Tips to help you when shopping

Use the traffic light system as your guide

Front of pack nutrition labels often follow a traffic light system, which is designed to easily guide you on products that may be high (red), medium (amber) or low (green) in calories, fat, saturated fat, sugars, and salt.

In general, a food or drink that has green on the label is a healthier choice. Amber means neither high nor low, so you can eat foods with all or mostly amber on the label most of the time. But red on the label means the food is high in fat, saturated fat, salt or sugars, and you should eat these foods less often and in small amounts.

Food additives and
E Numbers

EU legislation has ensured that all food additives be allocated an ‘E’ number. For manufacturers, this means that they do not need to put a long list of ingredients on their product labels, instead they use E numbers. Food additives are substances added intentionally to products to perform certain technological functions, for example to colour, sweeten or preserve.

E numbers are often viewed as potentially harmful, however this is not always the case. For example E101 is the E number for vitamin B12 which can act as a colouring agent. E310, E311 and E312 covers gallates which are antioxidants and are potentially harmful.

Preservatives prolong the shelf-life of foods by preventing micro-organism growth such as mould. Many preservatives are dangerous in high doses so whilst not dangerous in one food, if present in many foods you consume, they may be risky. Others such as vinegar are not harmful at all.

Check for allergens

For those with food allergies, small amounts of trace ingredients can cause serious symptoms or even be life-threatening. Food standard laws require the top food allergens, including peanuts, nuts, milk, eggs, sesame seeds, fish, shellfish, soy and wheat, to be clearly declared on the food label. This is most commonly done by putting the allergen in bold text.

Use the +353 rule

Eating too much saturated fat, sodium and added sugars is associated with adverse health effects, so you generally want to eat less of them. When buying any packaged foods, use the +353 rule as your threshold.

That means if a product is over 3g fat per 100g, over 5g sugar per 100g and over 0.3g salt per 100g, it will not be the best product to consume. If you’re choosing food and drinks that are high in fat, sugar and salt, have these less often and in small amounts.

Guidelines for telling if a food is high in fat, sugar, salt:

Fat is less than 3g per 100g
Sugar is less than 5g per 100g
Salt is 0.3g or less per 100g

Your health and wellbeing matter to us, which is why we invite you to take this digital medical check-up which will provide an overall and updated assessment of your health, including areas you've probably never explored!