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Study: Kern No. 3 for fast-food, convenience stores
| Tuesday, Apr 29 2008 12:01 AM
Last Updated: Tuesday, Apr 29 2008 8:17 AM
Reversing the obesity and diabetes epidemic has more to do with just getting off the couch.
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4.48-to-1: The ratio of fast food and convenience stores to supermarkets and produce vendors in California
5.23-to-1: The ratio of fast food and convenience stores to supermarkets and produce vendors in Kern County
21.2: Percent of California residents who are obese
28.2: Percent of Kern residents who are obese
6.8: Percent of California residents who have diabetes
10.2: Percent of Kern residents who have diabetes
Source: “Designed for Disease: The Link Between Local Food Environments and Obesity and Diabetes,” a study done by the California Center for Public Health Advocacy, PolicyLink and the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research
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A McDonald's restaurant sign is seen next to a Wendy's sign in Ferndale, Mich.
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It’s making sure the environment someone faces, once they get off the couch, isn’t filled with McDonald’s, Burger King, 7-Eleven and KFC, health researchers and experts said Monday.
According to a new study released Tuesday, Kern County is near the top of the list for its concentration of fast-food restaurants and convenience stores.
Compared to the other 23 California counties with more than 250,000 residents, Kern sits at No. 3 with 5.23 times as many fast-food restaurants and convenience stores than supermarkets and produce vendors, according to the study from the nonprofit, nonpartisan California Center for Public Health Advocacy, the research institute PolicyLink and the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.
The center then compared the counties ratio of fast-food and convenience stores to supermarkets and produce vendors to the areas’ obesity and diabetes prevalence, finding a correlation, according to the study.
Adults living in areas with more than five times as many fast-food restaurants and convenience stores than grocery stores and produce vendors had a 20 percent higher prevalence of obesity and a 23 percent higher prevalence of diabetes than adults living in areas with less abundant quick food options.
Locally, Kern was first for diabetes prevalence, among the counties surveyed, at 10.2 percent. For obesity, it’s fourth with 28.2 percent of residents obese.
The center combined data from UCLA’s 2005 California Health Interview Survey, which questioned 45,000 households, the 2000 U.S. Census and the 2005 InfoUSA Business File, for the locations of retail food outlets.
“All the fast food and convenience stores really are environmental toxins,” said Harold Goldstein, executive director of the California Center for Public Health Advocacy. “It’s the environment around us that’s making us sick.”
California Restaurant Association President and CEO Jot Condie doesn’t buy this research, saying that virtually every restaurant offers healthy choices.
“To suggest that living near a quick service restaurant is a health threat akin to living next to a coal plant is ludicrous,” he said in a statement. “Restaurants are playing a role in making more choices available, but in the end, individuals control what, where and when they eat.”
Restaurants are advertising meal options that look healthier, which makes eating healthy even trickier, said Megan Henry, a nutritionist with Clinica Sierra Vista.
“KFC is doing the trans fat-free thing, but it’s still fried chicken,” she said. “There’s an element of personal responsibility, but there’s a big part to be played by our environment.”
And when you factor in rising grocery costs, hot weather and lack of transportation, reaching for the closest and cheapest food option can be appealing, she said.
Bakersfield mother-of-two Patricia Martinez sympathizes with this.
Buying nachos and churros for her children from a food cart in east Bakersfield Monday afternoon, she explained that she does try to buy fruits and vegetables when she shops at FoodMaxx, which is a roughly three-minute drive from her home.
But twice a week, the family eats fast food — McDonald’s is the norm — because she is too tired to cook.
Plus, Martinez admits she doesn’t know how to “eat healthy.”
“They eat macaroni cheese,” she said of her kids’ favorite. “If I could, I probably would serve that every day, but with chicken or corn, of course.”
The California Center for Public Health Advocacy promotes education. This includes requiring restaurants to post nutritional information on menu boards, which Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed last year.
The center would also like to see:
• incentives, such as low-interest loans and grants, for retail store development and improvement;
• promotion of smaller-scale markets, like mobile vendors, farmers’ markets and cooperatives;
• measures ensuring low-income communities can take advantage of upcoming changes to the food offered by WIC, which includes fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low-fat dairy, and
• zoning changes to limit how many fast-food restaurants can operate in an area.
The Kern County Public Health Services Department is working to identify “food deserts,” areas in the county that lack food options, said spokesman Daniel Kim.
The department also plans to offer a farmers’ market at its building on Mt. Vernon Avenue that hosts vendors who take food stamps and WIC vouchers, he said.