obesity

After 44 years as president of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, Michael Jacobson is stepping down. During his long tenure, Jacobson not only helped develop nutrition labels, he “has also had a hand in halting the marketing of many sugar-filled foods to children, reducing salt levels in packaged foods, and banning transfats,” says NPR.

FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb says the agency "will provide additional, practical guidance" to food retailers by the end of the year so they will be ready to comply with menu-labeling rules when they take effect, which is now scheduled for May 2018. The FDA announced it was going forward with the May 2018 target at the same time New York City agreed in court not to enforce its own labeling law until next May.

Diners can get a day's worth of calories, roughly 2,000 for an adult, from the Pasta Napoletana entree at The Cheesecake Factory or the Cheeseburger Omelette sold by IHOP, says the Center for Science in the Public Interest in its annual Xtreme Eating Awards. The consumer watchdog group declared the 2,310-calorie Pasta Napoletana to be "worst adapted pasta" and the 1,990-calorie Cheeseburger Omelette as the "least original breakfast."

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue mixed humor, keen political rhetoric and "a fiercely unapologetic tone" as he explained why he ordered a slow down in USDA school food rules in one of his first decisions in office, says the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Perdue defended the decision during a speech to the School Nutrition Association, which represents school food directors.

With judges split 5-2, the Pennsylvania Comonwealth Court upheld Philadelphia's 1.5-cent-an-ounce tax on sweetened beverages, the second win in court by the city, said Philadelphia Magazine. "Still, the ruling doesn’t conclude the soda tax war," said the magazine, because the American Beverage Association and local businesses could appeal to the state Supreme Court.

Ten percent of the world’s population is now obese, and obesity levels are rising even in countries previously known for food scarcity, says a study designed by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.

One in five adults in the industrialized world is obese and nearly one in six children is overweight or obese, says a report by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The report also projects “a steady increase in obesity rates until at least 2030.”

Slightly more than 63 percent of Americans surveyed by Gallup last year said they have healthy diets. The figure, based on more than 177,000 interviews as part of a Gallup project with Sharecare, was the lowest since the project began in 2008 and was the sixth year in a row of a decline from the peak of 67.7 percent in 2010.

Voters in Santa Fe, New Mexico, decide today whether to adopt a 2-cent-per-ounce tax on sugary beverages — not just on sodas, but on sweetened sports drinks like Gatorade, lemonades and caffeinated energy drinks, among others, says U.S. News & World Report. Artificially sweetened drinks, infant formula, chocolate milk, pure fruit juices, and weight-loss drinks like Ensure would be exempted.

A large majority — 85 percent — of the parents polled about food marketing said foodmakers should reduce advertising to induce children to eat unhealthy foods, said the Rudd Center for Food and Obesity. The University of Connecticut center said that since 2012 support increased among parents for "policies to promote healthy eating habits for their children in the media, schools and communities."

The nation’s first soda tax, Berkeley, California’s one-cent-per-ounce levy, hasn’t impacted retail businesses, but it has reduced soda purchases by 9.6 percent, says a new study by the University of North Carolina.

The Obama administration gave a cold shoulder to Gov. Paul LePage's proposal to bar Mainers from spending food stamps on soda and candy. LePage "is optimistic the new administration will approve his revived proposal," says The Associated Press, adding that lawmakers in Tennessee and Alabama are pursuing the same idea.

People will eat more healthy food if prices are lowered and consume less unhealthy food and fewer sugary beverages if they cost more, say researchers who performed a meta-analysis of 30 studies on the issue. Co-author Ashkan Afshin said the meta-analysis demonstrated causality: "Our results show how 10 to 50 percent changes in price of foods and beverages at checkout could influence consumers’ purchasing behaviors over a relatively short period of time.”

The city council in Santa Fe, NM, scheduled a public hearing for March 8 on Mayor Javier Gonzales' proposal to put a 2-cent-an-ounce tax on sugar-sweetened beverages to generate money for early childhood education, says the New Mexican newspaper. The council agreed unanimously to call the public hearing after an advisory committee voted, 6-1, in favor of the soda tax.

In 2010, celebrity chef Jamie Oliver aired a reality show, "Food Revolution," about Huntington, W.Va., which had been ranked by the Centers for Disease Control as the nation's most unhealthy metropolitan area. The city's schools were at the center of the story. In the latest story from The Food & Environment Reporting Network, published in partnership with The Huffington Post's Highline, reporter Jane Black tells the story of what happened in the Cabell County cafeterias after Oliver left town.

New population data show that in 23 of the 50 states, at least 35 percent of adults are obese, a startling increase in a decade, said the Centers for Disease Control. Before 2013, adult obesity did not reach these rates in a single state.