A five-year-old ban on the use of trans fats in New York City restaurants has sharply reduced the consumption of these unhealthy fats among fast-food customers, a study by city health officials has found.
In 2007, the New York City Board of Health, spurred on by the administration of Mayor Michael Bloomberg, adopted a regulation that forced restaurants to all but eliminate the use of partially hydrogenated vegetable oils and spreads, the main sources of trans fats in the U.S. diet.
The ban appears to have replica cartier watches had the intended effect. A new analysis of thousands of lunch receipts, collected at fast-food chains before and after the ban went into effect, estimates that the average trans fat content of customers’ meals has dropped by 2.5 grams, from about 3 grams to 0.5 grams.
Additionally, the proportion of meals containing less than 0.5 grams—an amount generally considered negligible—increased from 32% to 59% between 2007 and 2009.
“For consumers, the transition was seamless. Most New Yorkers didn’t even notice,” says Christine Curtis, a coauthor of the study and the director of the city’s Nutrition Strategy Program. “And now we know that it has really made a difference.”
The study is the first to examine the real-world impact of trans fat restrictions in restaurants, Curtis and her colleagues say. And it suggests that health regulations at the local level can have a measurable effect on public consumption—an important finding at a time when another pending citywide ban, this one on large sodas and sugary drinks, is generating headlines and controversy.
The study included fast-food chains such as McDonald’s, Burger King, Subway, KFC, and Pizza Hut. Although the analysis was replica cartier bangles limited to New York City, many of those chains have chosen to eliminate trans fats nationwide as a result of the ban, Curtis says. “It’s a big health benefit for New Yorkers, but really we’re looking at a much broader impact, as well,” she says.
Restaurants and food manufacturers use partially hydrogenated oils and fats in baking, frying, and food processing. (Small amounts of trans fats also occur naturally in meat and dairy products.) Trans fats have been shown to raise “bad” LDL cholesterol while lowering “good” HDL cholesterol, and even moderate consumption has been linked to an increased risk of heart disease.
As of 2006, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has required food manufacturers to include trans fats on the nutritional label of packaged foods. But because Americans eat more than one-third of their meals outside the home, this regulation addressed only part of the problem.
Next page:
No comments:
Post a Comment