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Is food marketed as healthy inadvertently fuelling obesity?

While it was previously believed that consumers overeat healthy food because they underestimate its calorie content, the findings of US researchers, led by Jacob Suher of the University of Texas at Austin, suggest it is due to the implicitly-held belief that healthy food is less filling – even when the calorie content is clearly displayed.

The findings are particularly relevant given the increasing prevalence of foods marketed as being healthy, according to the researchers.

“Our research suggests that the influx of health information may ironically abet the obesity epidemic,” they wrote.

“While it is preferable for people to choose healthy food over unhealthy food, if people tend to over-consume foods labelled as healthy then the proliferation of health foods and nutrition labels could actually lead to an increase in calorie intake. Accordingly, the effects of this phenomenon would be especially detrimental if unhealthy foods are portrayed as healthy.”

They cited the example of US food service chain Chipotle which claims to be healthy by using natural ingredients when in fact its burritos can contain up to 1000 calories.

You can read the full article HERE

 

Food Labelling Services comments:

With the change in nutrition labelling under the Food Information Regulations 2011, all products (except a few exempt categories) from December 2016 will have to declare nutritional information. It is the up to the consumer to be educated in how many calories they require per day, and to ensure that they stick to this limit, or reduce this limit if they are trying to lost weight.