Hispanic kids getting “double dose” of marketing of food with unhealthy sugar content

A new study conducted by researchers from the University of Connecticut reveals Hispanic youth to be at the receiving end of a ''double dose'' of food marketing that promoted products high in sugar, saturated fat, and sodium.

The analysis was carried out on the basis of the advertising patterns of 26 of the largest food, beverage, and restaurant corporations in the US which revealed they had disproportionately targeted minorities with nutritionally-deficient products.

''This report highlights important disparities in the food and beverage industry's heavy marketing of unhealthy foods to Hispanic and black youth, and the corresponding lack of promotion of healthier options,'' said Amelie G Ramirez, director of Salud America!, one of the organisations, involved in the study, in a press release.

''Given the role food marketing plays in influencing the diets of youth of color, there is increasing demand for heightened industry self-regulation and community-based action,'' Ramirez added.

This was not new as in the last 30 years, childhood obesity rates had more than doubled in children and quadrupled in adolescents of all races. But minority communities reported even higher rates.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued the Health Disparities and Inequalities Report in 2011 to focus on how they could eliminate disparities. With the prevalence of obesity higher among blacks and Hispanics than whites, the CDC calls for addressing health disparities among minorities as a priority on federal, state, and local levels.

Meanwhile, NBC News reported that the results of the research conducted by the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity at the University of Connecticut, the African-American Collaborative Obesity Research Network and the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio confirmed earlier reports that advertisers of unhealthy foods were mostly finding kids easy target their products.

The research appeared to explain why black and Hispanic young people tended to be more obese than their white counterparts. According to reports, African-American children and teens saw 70 per cent more food-related TV advertising than white kids did.

"This is a clear case of tactics that must be profitable from the business perspective but at the cost of fostering an environment that promotes poor health in black and Hispanic youth in particular," explained chair of the African American Collaborative Obesity Research Network Shiriki Kumanyika,

latinpost.com reported.

In 2013, a University of Michigan study found that regardless of body weight, teens had high brain activity during food commercials compared to nonfood commercials.

It said watching TV commercials of people munching on hot, crispy French fries or sugar-laden cereal resonates more with teens than advertisements about cell phone plans or the latest car. (See: Food commercials excite teen brains more than mobile plans, cars).