Need To Establish School Nutrition Standards And Limit Access To Competitive Foods

As American school-kids become fatter and fatter, the Institute of Medicine has indicated there is a serious need to establish school nutrition standards and limit access to competitive foods. Being overweigh/obese during childhood significantly increases a person’s chances of developing serious illnesses, such as diabetes type 2, cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, and many cancers. When people make poor food choices and consume insufficient quantities of calcium they are placing their bodies at risk of developing osteoporosis.

Concern over the expanding obesity problem has been growing over the last decade throughout the United States. School nutrition policy initiatives have sprung up at federal, state and local levels. The Institute of Medicine says that these initiatives have been patchy and inconsistent.

Congress commissioned the CDC and the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to make recommendations about appropriate nutritional stands for the availability, sale, content and consumption of foods at school, including a focus on competitive foods. The CDC and IOM have produced a report called “Nutrition Standards for Foods in Schools: Leading the Way toward Healthier Youth”.

The report included the following recommendations:

— The main source of nutrition at school should be federally-reimbursable school nutrition programs

— The sale of competitive foods should be limited

— Only competitive foods that are deemed ‘nutritious’ should be available, such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, plus non-fat or low-fat dairy products.

“Nutrition Standards For Foods In Schools: Leading The Way Toward Healthier Youth”
Institute of Medicine of the National Academies (USA)
— Click here to download the report (pdf – 334 kb)

Written by: Christian Nordqvist
Editor: Medical News Today