Health News
- Scheduling Lunch After Recess, Very Unusual In Elementaries, May Lead To Less Food Waste And Better Nutrition, Study Says
Scheduling school lunch later in the day could help children to eat more nutritious foods and reduce food waste, according to a study at seven schools in Utah. Researchers found that children threw away more food when they ate lunch before recess instead...
- As School-lunch Debate Puts Attention On Rejected Meals, We Might Consider A Bigger Problem: Food Wasted At Home
The new nutrition rules for school meals have led some students to throw away food they're served. Schools across the country are estimated to waste $1.2 billion worth of food every year, based on extrapolations from a study the National Institutes...
- Most Kentucky Schools Adapting Well To New Federal Nutrition Rules, Usda Official With Kentucky Background Says
While one Kentucky school district has ditched the federal school-meals program and the money that comes with it, an official of the U.S. Department of Agriculture?s Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services says that most Kentucky schools are creatively...
- Ky., High In Childhood Obesity, Fights It With Better School Meals, Increased Activity Requirements And Maybe Help From Big Bird
By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Kentucky children are some of the nation's fattest. In 2011, the last year for which data are complete, Kentucky ranked sixth in the U.S. in the percentage of obese 2-to 4-year-olds from low-income families...
- Some Parents Complain About Healthier School Lunches, But Usda Says It's On Course To Improve Public Health
A few school districts in other states are opting out of a federal-funded school lunch program that was touted by first lady Michelle Obama to provide healthier options to students, and some parents in Harlan County are complaining about the new...
Health News
Christian County Public Schools ban brought-in fast food as part of an effort to battle childhood obesity, a big problem in Ky.
Fast food is no longer a lunch option for students in Christian County Public Schools, Margarita Cambest reports for Kentucky New Era after the Board of Education voted to ban "commercially prepared, restaurant meals" Tuesday. Parents have been bringing fast-food meals to schools, even though 14 schools offer free meals under a federal program.
"Prepared foods must now be put in a non-identifiable container to pass the cafeteria doors?essentially meaning no logos," Cambest reports. "Takeout containers and bags must be discarded, and the food placed in a lunch box or brown bag if brought from home. Soda is out as well. The consumption of bottled or canned carbonated beverages during meal times is also forbidden."
Sandra McIntosh, the system's food-service director, "said the decision allows her to enforce a federal mandate that has been questioned by some local principals," Cambest reports. But then she notes that the federal school-lunch program "leaves the authority to control the sale of foods in direct competition with the national program with state and local agencies, according to the United States Department of Agriculture," which runs the program.
Changes in the program, which McIntosh said have made meals "more nutritional" by having "lower fat, more whole-grain and more dark green and red vegetables, have been unpopular with many students and parents.
A study by USDA's Economic Research Service in 2005 showed that "Students in schools that offered greater quantities of fruits and vegetables consumed more of these foods by most measures." And fast food has more calories. Research at the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity says on days that children eat fast food, they consume 126 additional calories and teens consume 310 more calories. The center says 33 percent of children and 41 percent of teens consume fast food daily.
"Prepared foods must now be put in a non-identifiable container to pass the cafeteria doors?essentially meaning no logos," Cambest reports. "Takeout containers and bags must be discarded, and the food placed in a lunch box or brown bag if brought from home. Soda is out as well. The consumption of bottled or canned carbonated beverages during meal times is also forbidden."
Sandra McIntosh, the system's food-service director, "said the decision allows her to enforce a federal mandate that has been questioned by some local principals," Cambest reports. But then she notes that the federal school-lunch program "leaves the authority to control the sale of foods in direct competition with the national program with state and local agencies, according to the United States Department of Agriculture," which runs the program.
Changes in the program, which McIntosh said have made meals "more nutritional" by having "lower fat, more whole-grain and more dark green and red vegetables, have been unpopular with many students and parents.A study by USDA's Economic Research Service in 2005 showed that "Students in schools that offered greater quantities of fruits and vegetables consumed more of these foods by most measures." And fast food has more calories. Research at the Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity says on days that children eat fast food, they consume 126 additional calories and teens consume 310 more calories. The center says 33 percent of children and 41 percent of teens consume fast food daily.
Kentucky children rank third worst among the states for in obesity, with 37.1 percent of them considered either overweight or obese, according to the Child Policy Research Center.
- Scheduling Lunch After Recess, Very Unusual In Elementaries, May Lead To Less Food Waste And Better Nutrition, Study Says
Scheduling school lunch later in the day could help children to eat more nutritious foods and reduce food waste, according to a study at seven schools in Utah. Researchers found that children threw away more food when they ate lunch before recess instead...
- As School-lunch Debate Puts Attention On Rejected Meals, We Might Consider A Bigger Problem: Food Wasted At Home
The new nutrition rules for school meals have led some students to throw away food they're served. Schools across the country are estimated to waste $1.2 billion worth of food every year, based on extrapolations from a study the National Institutes...
- Most Kentucky Schools Adapting Well To New Federal Nutrition Rules, Usda Official With Kentucky Background Says
While one Kentucky school district has ditched the federal school-meals program and the money that comes with it, an official of the U.S. Department of Agriculture?s Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services says that most Kentucky schools are creatively...
- Ky., High In Childhood Obesity, Fights It With Better School Meals, Increased Activity Requirements And Maybe Help From Big Bird
By Melissa Patrick Kentucky Health News Kentucky children are some of the nation's fattest. In 2011, the last year for which data are complete, Kentucky ranked sixth in the U.S. in the percentage of obese 2-to 4-year-olds from low-income families...
- Some Parents Complain About Healthier School Lunches, But Usda Says It's On Course To Improve Public Health
A few school districts in other states are opting out of a federal-funded school lunch program that was touted by first lady Michelle Obama to provide healthier options to students, and some parents in Harlan County are complaining about the new...