Convenient Obesity

In South Los Angeles, researchers have determined a culprit to childhood obesity. They believe convenience store that sell sugary snacks, chips, and sodas play a huge role. They found many of the students daily bought snacks and would easily down 356 calories. And sometimes students would even get a snack more than once.

Obesity concerns spur calls to limit new convenience stores in South L.A.
The proposed rules, an outgrowth of last year's city restrictions on new fast-food restaurants, are prompted by links found by researchers between snack foods and obesity in poor communities.
By Jerry Hirsch
October 12, 2009

Links found by researchers between snack foods and obesity in poor communities are prompting new calls for more regulation of convenience stores in South Los Angeles.

The proposed new regulations under discussion are an outgrowth and expansion of last year's city restrictions on new fast-food restaurants in a 32-square-mile area of South Los Angeles. The area is home to about 500,000 residents, including those who live in West Adams, Baldwin Hills and Leimert Park.

Motivated by new data focusing on convenience stores, civic activists and a City Council member favor limiting the development of new convenience stores.

A study by Santa Monica think tank Rand Corp. published in the research journal Health Affairs last week said calories from snacks were a likely culprit of higher obesity rates in South Los Angeles. The authors also found that South Los Angeles had a dramatically higher concentration of the type of small convenience store that sells caloric snacks than other sections of the city. More...