Shared Concerns and Opportunity for Joint Action in Creating a Food Environment That Supports Health
1
Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
2
Department of Applied Psychology, Bouve College of Health Sciences, Northeastern University, Boston, MA 02115, USA
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Nutrients 2019, 11(1), 41; https://doi.org/10.3390/nu11010041
Received: 15 November 2018 / Revised: 17 December 2018 / Accepted: 21 December 2018 / Published: 25 December 2018
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Eating Disorders and Obesity: The Challenge for Our Times)
The food industry is a for-profit industry with high relevance to universal eating disorders prevention. To date, policy which targets the food industry and food environment has been underutilized in efforts to decrease the incidence of eating disorders and associated risk factors. In contrast, food policy has been extensively leveraged with the aim of reducing the incidence of obesity. While philosophical misalignments with these later efforts may have constituted an obstacle to identifying the food environment as a key target for eating disorders prevention, food policy is an area where shared interests can be found. Specifically, a shared goal of obesity and eating disorders prevention efforts is creating a food environment that supports health, while minimizing the influence of the food industry that profits from the sale of highly palatable, processed foods and “diet” foods and from increasing portions of foods served and eaten.
Keywords:
eating disorders; obesity; prevention; food industry; food environment; food policy