Kids and Calories

As I have said before, I am involved in two vending machine initiatives. One of them is research and will take place next fall (I will do the final preparation this summer, but have been working with my partners for almost a year)

The other is a community based intervention driven by a small grant. As real life goes, it has gotten messy.  The original goal was to increase the amount of healthy vending in 50% of the local high schools.  We are now trying to do "something" in just one school.  There really isn't a way to make the machines healthy unless we change all the products, and we don't have that power.  We talked about teaching the students about food labels (of course my idea) and using FOP systems to identify the healthier options. Of course, none of that really makes the vending healthier.  It only educates the students on what to look for in a product.

As we were discussing this today one of the people in the room said, to me... "Deirdre, they don't care about calories," to which someone else said, "And most of them don't need to."  
We all paused.  Then said, "well that second part's not true."
(recall that more than 30% of adolescents ARE overweight or obese)

So much more to say about this issue, but I haven't the time, except to say.  The Ottawa Charter, written in 1986 made a very important point: we need policy, education and motivation.  All of these are necessary to create change.
Sadly, for this one activity - we do not have the time or manpower to make that happen.
 My research for next fall - will.

Highlights from the Proposed Vending Rule - document

Here is the information on the document from which I am pulling out a few interesting points:

Food Labeling:

Calorie Labeling of Articles of Food in Vending Machines NPRM

Preliminary Regulatory Impact Analysis 

DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Food and Drug Administration

Docket No. FDA-2011-F 0171

Office of Regulations Policy and Social Sciences

Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition

March 2011 

And my little points of interest are:

• There is one vending machine for every 40 people in the USA
• 10% of the items in the machines do not have nutrient data available and would require laboratory analysis to be in compliance with the law
• Foods eaten away from home are often associated with over consumption of calories because of their extreme caloric density.  Vending machine "meals/snacks" make up 5% of away from home eating.
• "present-bias" is a term that refers to thinking about what we want right here and now and not the consequence it may have on our weight or health in the future.  Having caloric information "in our faces" at the time of purchase may have an impact on this phenomena.
• 79 Million adults are considered to be obese (USA)
• A lot of convoluted math was thrown out in this document and by convoluted I mean complicated and over my head.  The authors of the report suggest that informing consumers about the calories in foods may lead to a reduction in caloric intake.  In order for this policy to be beneficial, we should decrease caloric intake from vending foods or drinks by 140 cals per day*.  If this is done, they extrapolate (with caution), we could see a decrease in the obesity rate in adults by 4.3%.  This regards only this intervention, not other strategies. 
• Vending machine food is associated with higher calories, thus weight gain and obesity.  Obesity is itself related to adverse health outcomes, disability, decreased productivity and abbreviated life expectancy.  However, people tend to live just as long when they are obese, just not terribly well it seems.
• I am really concerned about the sentence below regarding the nutrient analysis and disclosure piece - as stated on page 16 (the underlined part esp.).  In other words, the proof of accuracy should not be a choice but a given.

Although the proposed rule does not mandate recordkeeping, vending machine operators will likely need to be able to ensure that calorie disclosures for covered vending machine foods are accurate and consistent without needing to re-analyze these foods. 

• The exception to the rule (p. 18)! Here is the kicker. It says in this document that if total calorie content is included on the label and that label is viewable through the case (i.e a glass case) then the machine would be exempt from the new rules.  If we could walk up and see that the fritos have 300 calories for the bag we are thinking of buying - before we buy it, then the machine is already doing what the law intends.  Thus, I have two things to say.  One - years ago I said, turn the packages around - and I still think that is a fine start.  Two, - front of pack labels :)

The document is available on the Internet here.
**correction - that should read 140 calories a week.

Proposed Vending Rule

Right before the IOM released the Phase II report that I mentioned yesterday (and printed in full today), I had gotten my hands on the text for the proposed vending machine labeling rule - mentioned previously.
I had been in recent meetings with some colleagues on campus in regards to a vending machine initiative. We knew that the FDA was supposed to give its final rule on both menu and vending labeling by the end of this year.
As I said, I have mentioned the calorie disclosure rules here and am following the progress, but basically it has to do with a mandate in the ACA. (if you click the link above you will get the better overview) This regards disclosing calorie content information at point of purchase, before purchase, so that customers make more informed choices.  Well at least they will have the information they need to make the informed choice  - there is no guarantee that they will use it and of course, education and promotion are key to all the initiatives (vending, menu and front of pack).
I found the full text by accident - I was just looking for an update.  There is not much more to share about the propsed rule, but the full document talks about the cost to vending companies and the projected benefits to consumers and  the country with regard to productivity, saved lives and reduced medical costs.  

All this preamble was necessary for me to tell you some things that  I found interesting or newsworthy in the document.   So my friends, that is exactly what I will do - tomorrow :)


 

If you See it Read it

There is a push for front of package nutrient content information and it looks like it is going to happen. Unfortunately, it also looks like sugar content may not be as readily available. Some say this is due to the difficulty in capturing and quantifying the full amount of sugar - others say, and I am beginning to believe them, that the sugar or beet industry from which some of our sugar is produced, is fighting this part of the so far voluntary action, because they do not want to lose business.

When I see things like this, the positive part, the labeling, I realize that all my little ideas are 1) not impossible and 2) not unique!

Anyone remember when I was doing my MPH internship at the Sarasota Health Department (January 2007)? They did a phenomenal job of getting stickers on the vending machine items to designate healthy options and I pushed for putting the items in backwards so we could read the labels before we chose an item. That didn't happen of course, (no one listens to interns) , but if we have front of package food labels - TADA - problem solved!

Okay, just wanted to touch base, let you guys know I hadn't forgotten you and as my greatest passion, within the obesity prevention realm, is Informed Eating - I had to make a statement on this latest step in that direction.