Robert F Kennedy Jr claims seed oils are 'poisoning' us. Here's why he's wrong
Seed oils are in many foods. They are usually cheap and easy to cook with, and their inoffensive taste means they can be used in a huge variety of things. Go on any social media platform, though, and you will find self-appointed health influencers blaming them for everything from inflammation to the obesity epidemic. Politicians do it too: the man Donald Trump wants for his health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, has claimed that Americans are being “unknowingly poisoned” by them. But is any of this true, and should it change how you buy or cook your food?
To be clear, seed oils are oils extracted from – well, seeds. In the UK, the most common are rapeseed (known in the US as canola oil) and sunflower (both often called vegetable oil), though you will also find soybean, corn, grapeseed, rice bran and safflower in countless products.
Sarah Berry, a professor of nutritional sciences at King’s College London and chief scientist at the nutritional science company Zoe, says: “In the UK, the largest contributor of fat in most people’s diets is palm oil, which is often used for deep frying.” That isn’t a seed oil, but, she says: “Nearly all the rest of the oils that we consume come from seeds.”
Is that a problem? Well, one of the most common claims online is that seed oils promote inflammation, which – when it occurs excessively – has been linked to, among other things, type 2 diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease and cancer. But it is not quite this simple.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/jan/13/robert-f-kennedy-jr-claims-seed-oils-are-poisoning-us-heres-why-hes-wrong
If you took all the stupid coming out of his mouth and laid it end to end, it would reach from here to Jupiter, around it, and back
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