Steve - if you were skeptical about Big Food's response to the First Lady's Let's Move campaign to address the obesity epidemic, your hunch was correct.
McDonald's Corp spurned calls to assess the impact of its food on childhood obesity, and said its trademark clown Ronald McDonald would be hawking Happy Meals to kids for years to come. "This is about choice and we believe in the democratic process," Chief Executive Jim Skinner told a packed room at its shareholders' meeting, to an enthusiastic wave of applause. "This is about the personal and individual right to choose."
Steve - does this not sound exactly like Big Tobacco from yesteryear?
Shareholders of the world's largest fast-food chain resoundingly rejected a proposal that would have required it to issue a report outlining its role in the childhood obesity epidemic, saying customers were free to make their own dietary choices.
"Ronald McDonald is an ambassador to McDonald's and he is an ambassador for good. Ronald McDonald is going nowhere," Skinner said firmly, prompting more cheers from shareholders. Among the dissenters at the meeting was Dr. Donald Zeigler, director of Prevention and Health Lifestyles at the American Medical Association, who asked when the burger chain will stop marketing to children using Ronald McDonald. Zeigler, who is also visiting assistant professor at Rush University Medical Center, was one of 550 healthcare professionals who had signed an open letter to McDonald's pleading that it "stop making the next generation sick." On Tuesday, a watchdog group placed ads in newspapers across the country calling for McDonald's to stop marketing to children through the clown, toy giveaways and other tactics.
McDonald's shares have gained nearly 12 percent in the last four months and rallied to a record high of $82.63 on Thursday. But as experts point out, obese children often grow into obese adults, overburdening the entire healthcare system. Ironically, Miles White, chairman and chief executive of diversified healthcare company Abbott Laboratories, has been a director of the McDonald's board since 2009. Abbott makes a broad range of drugs, including cholesterol-lowering statins, and medical devices, such as heart stents used on patients with clogged arteries.
Steve - would I be going out on a limb to assume that if McDonald's offered a healthy menu at their current pricing, many more parents would choose the healthier fare?
Thursday, May 19, 2011
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1 comment:
You might be. I am always stunned when parents ask me how I get my child to eat apples (umm...I wash them?) because they don't think that their kids will eat fruit and so they never even try (Fruit! Not kale, bananas)
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