Clipping of news on Brazilian Culture, Law and Citizenship
 


Consumer News

Socioeconomic status influences access to healthy foods

08/14/2013

This article was translated by an automatic translation system, and was therefore not reviewed by people.







Research in the School of Public Health (FSP) USP shows that food marketing establishments located in neighborhoods with higher socioeconomic level showed an more healthy options, when compared to similar establishments, but located in areas of lower socioeconomic status. Ie, the higher the socioeconomic status, the more healthy food options

The study food Urban Environment in São Paulo, Brazil: evaluation, inequalities and association with dietary intake was conducted by a PhD in Public Health Nutrition Ana Clara Duran. Under the guidance of Professor Patricia Constant Jaime, the researcher studied food marketing establishments - restaurants, cafes, small neighborhood markets, supermarkets, street vendors, and others who commercialize food in 13 districts of the state capital.

Access to healthy foods was measured using indicators that gathered information on availability, variety, quality, price and advertising of foods: fruits and vegetables, soda and other sugary drinks, snacks and sandwich cookies.

In a second stage of the research, the researcher interviewed 1,842 adults living in the same districts regarding the consumption of the same foods studied (fruit and vegetables, soft drinks and other sugary drinks, snacks and sandwich cookies), food purchasing behavior and demographic and socioeconomic data .

With such information it was able to analyze the association between environmental food near home - availability, variety, quality, price and food advertising - and consumption of fruits, vegetables, and sugary drinks. Used for this statistical analysis - Multilevel models - adjusted for individual data.

After adjusting for individual measures of gender, age, education and income, high prices of sugary drinks in the poorest regions of São Paulo were associated with a lower chance of consuming them, while the association was inverse in the wealthiest neighborhoods of the city. Living close to markets and other establishments with fruit availability increased by about 50% to 70% chance of consuming fruit residents in five or more days a week.

Considering these findings the researcher concluded that there are differences in access to healthy food in São Paulo, favoring regions of the city of higher socioeconomic level. Furthermore, aspects of the food environment were associated with the consumption of fruit and sugary drinks.
Public policies and interventions aimed at reducing inequalities in people's access to healthy foods should consider the impact of aspects of the food environment - availability, price, variety and quality of healthy foods and unhealthy.

* Via Agency USP


Source: UOL - Modern Consumer

Our news are taken in full from our partner sites. For this reason, we can not change the contents of the same even in cases of typos.

This article was translated by an automatic translation system, and was therefore not reviewed by people.

Important:
The JurisWay site does not interfere in the work provided by doctrine, why only reflect the opinions, ideas and concepts of their authors.


  Subjects list
 
  Copyright (c) 2006-2009. JurisWay - All rights reserved.