Those wacky New Yorkers are at it again

Some of you may recall the somewhat unconventional tactics used by the New York City health commissioner in the war against obesity. Not only have they put laws into place that require chain restaurants to post calorie information on their menus, they have banned the use of trans fats in food production. Once they had those rules in place they started a fairly graphic advertising campaign against sugary drinks that showed a stream of fat being poured out of a bottle.  9DNZY6EMJZ6W

On the off chance that you Big Apple residents didn’t get the message the first time, though, the office of the health commissioner is back with a brand new ad.

And it’s worse.

It’s a video.

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New York continues to wage a battle against bulge

poundsNew York is probably not the first place you think of when it comes to healthy living.  It might be the first place you think of when it comes to pizza, bagels with a shmear, restaurants that are open twenty-four hours a day, street vendors selling hot dogs, and deli sandwiches bigger than your head, but that pretty much proves my point.  California generally holds the reputation as the place where the “granola loving health freaks” live, but as is the case with most stereotypes California and New York are actually pretty similar when it comes to the percentage of the population that is considered obese.  In 2008 approximately 23.1% of the population of California residents fell under the obese classification, while 23.5% of New Yorkers were in the same category.  For those of you that are curious, Colorado actually came in as the leanest state with “only” 18% of their population falling into an obese weight range.

In spite of their reputation as being lovers of unhealthy foods (or, perhaps, because of it) the lawmakers in New York have taken it upon themselves to wage a war against obesity, and their primary targets seem to be soda and restaurant food.  In 2008 the Governor of New York proposed a 15% sales tax on sugary drinks, and a few months later the New York City health commissioner made the case for the same kind of tax to be imposed on a federal level.  New York also ordered all chain restaurants to begin posting calorie counts on their menus and banned the use of trans fats in food production.

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