Introduction
Nowadays, the USA has one of the most widespread reputations as a country with public health problems. Typical Americans are usually associated with McDonald’s and other junk food restaurants. However, the important dilemma is whether this is a countrywide or city/state-focused tendency. To answer this question, it is crucial to examine public health policies and their influence on society’s health because they give an overall image of the state and city level to provide a more qualitative analysis.
Main body
To begin with, it is crucial to define the existence of public health issues in the US. First and foremost, the country’s citizens began eating junk food in 1960-1965 (Aronica, 2014). At that time, people knew little about the negative impacts on their life when eating fast food. However, at those times, the junk food market was experiencing few changes, and there were not many companies that dedicated their part of the revenue to research and development (R&D). Instead of using this strategy, people aimed to create a “family” recipe and use it the whole time. As a result, fast food was implemented naturally on a country’s level due to its simplicity and efficacy. Following this, while the fast-food eating tendency began in 1960-1965, the negative route to eating junk food by the whole population had been chosen because of the only company’s ambitions. Nowadays, the issue has a wide-spreading tendency due to the possibility of eating junk food at any place and anytime.
The first organization that tried to provide the issue of inappropriate nutrition, small physical activity, and obesity, as a result, was McDonald’s. This company was the first who see the opportunities of the fast-food industry’s monopolization. The burger and Coca-Cola, for only 10 cents, immediately developed a wide economic moat, which gave the opportunity to provide R&D in order to lessen the “materials” usage and increase the margin. Consequently, the company succeeds in implementing a great number of chemicals in its food. This was the start of the declining tendency of healthy eating and the rise of cheap, delicious, and fast-to-cook food. From this perspective, typical Americans are influenced by the McDonald’s company strategy, which transmitted the local issue to the whole country.
To solve the widespread tendency of bad nutrition, some institutions may regulate the company’s unfair behavior when speaking about healthcare issues. For instance, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) provided a strong marketing campaign for healthy food in schools. Specifically, all the institutions should be working on the state level and government level separately (Trust for America’s Health [TFAH], n.d.). However, the most effective strategy was reached when the department levels interacted and provided a qualitative campaign for increasing healthy food in educational institutions.
To analyze the specific public health policy, there is one example of how effective it is to work on a multi-level base. In 2017, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) decided to enforce the healthy-eating policy in school cafeterias (TFAH, n.d.). USDA increased the requirements for canteens and made the level of compliant cafes near 100%. In contrast, the FDA regulated the number of calories, which also made the national health level even higher. By implementing the strategy from the governmental position, all the organizations benefited from the multi-level work, which helped to increase the overall health level.
On the other hand, the strong external influence on the appropriate public health policy is lost from the personal (internal) perspective. In other words, if a person is told that junk food will harm their health, they can both appreciate the notion or ignore it equally. However, if the initiative goes directly from his or her mind, the person will refuse junk food with more probability than in the previous case. This results in the statement that if an organization makes people think independently, they might actively follow the trend. This tendency is fundamental in public health systems’ strategy of preventing people from being addicted to junk food. To be more specific, they provide a social marketing campaign by showing the negative results of eating too much junk food. At the same time, the institution provides a qualitative campaign for active life, which enforces the personal nutrition problem with fast food, as it gives not enough energy and lessens personal stamina.
By doing this, public health institutions possess a stable position in increasing the number of healthy people compared to individuals with nutrition or obesity problems. This provides a strong correlation between the healthcare system and society’s health status. The more system pays attention to the main issues, the more people positively change their lifestyle by refusing junk food and choosing an active lifestyle.
What is more, the consequence of implementing such a strategy is that people become more focused on their physical health by eating the right food. In some emergency cases, when a person cannot refuse to eat in a junk food restaurant, some big companies (McDonald’s, Burger King) provide a “healthy” menu, which is mostly free of chemicals and junk food effects on overall health. Even if companies adjusted their strategy to a healthy lifestyle due to the active social influence, the overall effect is positive (Eckelman, 2016). Those who cannot fit the “healthy” requirements should leave the market in the future, and those who benefit from forcing the healthy lifestyle marketing campaign will have more profits by paying for such advertising (Adult obesity facts, 2021). Despite the strong obesity issue nowadays, the overall tendency of a new generation moves toward a healthy lifestyle.
Conclusion
Overall, the nutrition issue is one of the most important for people who aim to live healthily. The negative tendency in the US has begun increasing with Mcdonald’s integration into the country’s nutrition process. While junk food cannot be eliminated externally by forcing people to refuse inappropriate nutrition, the USDA integrated a more effective “internal” strategy, which influenced people to live healthily. This helped the nation decrease the obesity tendency and implement a new style of life for many years.
References
Aronica, M. (2014). Where your favorite fast-food chains began. USA Today.
Adult obesity facts. (2021). Web.
Eckelman, M. J., & Sherman, J. (2016). Environmental impacts of the u.s. health care system and effects on public health. PLOS ONE, 11(6).
Trust for America’s Health, (n.d.). The state of Obesity 2018: Better policies for a Healthier America. Web.