A National Study of the Association Between Food Environments and County-Level Health Outcomes

Abstract

The food access/availability environment is an important determinant of health outcomes in metro and non-metro areas. Future research should focus on more refined specifications that capture variability across non-metro settings.

The Effect of Fast Food Restaurants on Obesity and Weight Gain

“…26 If we assume that the effect of fast food on weight gain for pregnant mothers is the same as for nonpregnant women (an admittedly strong assumption that is likely to give an upper bound estimate), then fast food restaurants near a woman's 25 According to our measure, about 33 percent of ninth graders in California were obese during the 1999-2007 period. Since obesity among adolescents (age [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19] approximately tripled from 1970 to the late 1990s, we estimate the increase in obesity of ninth graders in the past 30 years to be about 22 percentage points. Hence, we compute the effect as 1.7 percentage points (the estimated impact of fast food on obesity at 0.1 miles) multiplied by 0.067 (the share of schools at 0.1 miles in 1999-2007, assumed to be zero in the 1960s) divided by 22 percentage points.…”

“…Based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) 2000 growth charts, it only takes a weight gain of 3.6 pounds to move from the eightieth to the eighty-fifth percentile of the BMI distribution. Over a period of 30 weeks, 16 this corresponds to a gain of about 80 additional calories per school day. It would take 300 additional calories to move from the nintieth to the ninety-fifth percentile of BMI, where the later is the cutoff for obesity.…”

“…These amounts can be compared with the calories from a typical meal at a fast food restaurant, such as 540 calories for McDonald's Big Mac, 990 calories for Burger King's 16 Thirty weeks is the average length of time that the ninth graders are exposed to a nearby restaurant between the beginning of high school in September and the fitness test. BMI percentiles and median height for 14-year-old boys are taken from the CDC 2000 growth charts available from www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhanes/growthcharts/set1/ all.pdf.…”

Distribución espacial de la malnutrición infantil en Yerba Buena, Tucumán, Argentina (2014-2015)

“…Las peores condiciones registradas en el área urbana, especialmente por la carga de la malnutrición por exceso, puede ser entendida en el contexto de la transición nutricional, dado que estas zonas presentan mayor disponibilidad y oferta de alimentos industrializados y locales de comidas rápidas (Ahern, Brown y Dukas, 2011). En el caso de Yerba Buena, los paisajes alimentarios rurales carecen de esta oferta, a la vez que el relieve rural de sierras, su población dispersa y su infraestructura de transporte y servicios limitada propiciaría un gasto energético diario mayor al de las áreas urbanas.…”

Kansas Legislators Prioritize Obesity but Overlook Nutrition and Physical Activity Issues

“…24 Additionally, only 18.6% of Kansans report eating fruits and vegetables at least 5 times a day. 25 Previous research has identified a need to improve the built food environment through policy changes, 26 as well as addressing higher rates of obesity and physical inactivity among rural residents. 27 Kansas is a predominately rural state.…”