a recent study spent 13 years studying the eating habits of over 35,000 americans at fast food and full-service restaurants. their findings concluded that the chances of eating healthy at a restaurant are just about zero, or very very slim.
researchers at tufts university sifted through piles of data from the national health and nutrition examination survey that asked americans from 2003 to 2016 about what they recalled eating in the last 24 hours.
the results, published in the
journal of nutrition
, found that “eating out” almost never meant eating healthy.
inc. reports that
researchers used a method of measuring a meal’s healthfulness that was developed by the american heart association (aha) to examine the data.
they found that 70 per cent of fast food meals are completely non-nutritional, while half the meals at fancier, full service restaurants are also unhealthy for you. the meals that did meet the aha guidelines were almost non-existent, counting for 0.1 per cent of the data.
“our findings show that dining out is a recipe for unhealthy eating most of the time,” writes dr. dariush mozaffarian, the study’s senior author. still, 21 per cent of americans’ calories comes from eating out despite the drawbacks of restaurants.