LA Takes Steps to Slow Growth of Fast Food
By Hugh C. McBride
In an effort to curtail obesity and promote healthier lifestyles, city and county officials in Los Angeles are taking legislative aim at the fast food industry:
- On July 22, a city council committee unanimously passed a proposal that - if approved by the full council and signed by Mayor Anthony Villaragosa - would ban the opening of new fast food restaurants in a 32-square-mile area in South Los Angeles.
- Seventeen days later, county supervisors Zev Yaroslavsky and Michael Antonovich announced that they plan to propose an ordinance that would require all fast-food chains and restaurants in L.A. County to display calorie information on menus.
In a July 22 article about the proposed moratorium, Los Angeles Times staff writer Molly Hennessy-Fiske noted that weight-related health disorders are of particular concern in South L.A., where the obesity rate is considerably higher than the county average.
"In April, the county Department of Public Health released a study showing that 30 percent of South Los Angeles adults were obese, compared with about 21 percent of adults countywide," Hennessy-Fiske wrote. "South L.A. also has the highest incidence of diabetes in the county, 11.7 percent compared with 8.1 percent for the county as a whole."
An Aug. 8 Reuters article about the county's calorie-disclosure proposal reported that the area has seen a significant spike in the prevalence of overweight adults, with the countywide obesity rate having risen from 14.3 percent in 1997 to 20.9 percent eight years later.
Leave a Comment