As of midnight last Friday, big chain restaurants in New York City can now be fined between 200 and 2,000 dollars if they do not show calorie counts on their menus. Since May, city health inspectors have had the authority to cite restaurants that did not comply with the new ruling, but the right to fine them has only just come into force. Over 12,000 restaurants have been cited up to 12th July, according to the New York Times.
New York City’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene went for a no fine period to give restaurants time to comply, and this was extended after the New York State Restaurant Association challenged the new rule in a federal court. The Association’s challenge to delay the start of the right to fine was eventually denied, but the challenge to the rule itself is still pending an appeal decision.
A spokesman for the Restaurant Association, Chuck Hunt, told the Times on Friday, if the appeal finds in their favour, and the authorities have already started issuing fines, “Are they going to give the fines back?”
The calorie count drive is part of the City’s health campaign to reduce obesity. It affects big chains like Burger King, McDonald’s, Dunkin Donuts, Starbucks and Subway, that have more than 15 outlets nationwide, or about 10 per cent of the city’s 23,000 restaurants. However, these account for around one third of food New Yorkers consume outside the home.
Health officials are promoting the initiative as part of a strategy to drive down the city’s 56 per cent obesity rate. They said most people don’t know how many calories they are eating, and if they did, they would eat less.
The new calorie posting rule was supposed to take effect in April, but the New York State Restaurant Association took the city to court. Judge Richard J Holwell, of the United States District Court in Manhattan eventually ruled against the Association, but they then took it to appeal, which is still pending a decision. However, the delay to the start of the fining period was not extended.
According to the New York Times, a quick check in Midtown of half a dozen of the big chain restaurants on Friday revealed they had all posted calorie information, a big change from early May, when the citations started.
A nutrition teacher who a Times reporter found looking at a menu in a McDonald’s restaurant on West 42nd Street in Midtown Manhattan said he thought it was a good idea and knowing the calorie value of menu items might make customers choose lighter meals:
“A Big Mac is 300 calories less than an Angus mushroom and Swiss burger,” he said.
A typical McDonald’s Big Mac, large fries and medium Coke comes to 1,320 calories which is about two thirds of the average adult’s daily calorie need. A Burger King triple Whopper with cheese has nearly as many calories, 1,230, and that’s without the fries and coke.
Chuck Hunt said the New York Restaurant Association had never been against the idea of giving calorie information to customers. The Association objects to the rigid way the city’s health authorities have imposed the ruling, he said. If they had been more flexible, said Hunt, it was doubtful the Association would have pursued the challenge as far in the courts.
Another customer interviewed by the New York Times, an astrologer who stopped at a Starbucks on Broadway, said she did not like the idea that the city had imposed the ruling, referring to the action as “Big Brotherish”.
A spokeswoman for the Center for Science in the Public Interest said in October last year that it was time chain restaurants stopped being afraid of showing calories on menus and looked at it as another way to compete more effectively with each other by offering consumers healthier dishes.
Click here for New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Click here for New York State Restaurant Association (NYSRA).
Sources: New York Times, MNT archives.
Written by: Catharine Paddock, PhD