A consumer group has issued an ultimatum to McDonald’s, according to www.consumeraffairs.com – do away with the Happy Meals or else. The Washington D.C.-based nonprofit, Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), has promised it will file a class action complaint against McDonald’s because providing toys with unhealthy food to encourage children to eat unhealthy food is illegal under consumer protection statutes in California, Texas, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia, and New Jersey. CSPI may have got a little overboard when it compared McDonald’s to a child molester.
“McDonald’s is the stranger in the playground handing out candy to children,” says CSPI attorney Stephen Gardner.
In response, McDonalds says it is committed to a responsible approach to its menu and is offering more healthy choice options than ever before. Many parents may succumb to an occasional McDonald’s out of convenience and children’s choice, so this approach has the potential to backfire.
Ever since 1979, McDonald’s has offered the toy as part of the Happy Meal. Often it partnered with Disney to co-promote the latest movie, however, Disney ended that relationship in 2006, perhaps because of the increasing focus on childhood obesity.
This is not the only time McDonald’s has faced litigation over its food. The American Heart Association sued and settled with McDonald’s over the amount of trans fats in its food. The settlement reached in 2005, amounted to $7 million with another $1.5 million for an advertising campaign to inform the public about the dangers of trans fats. After that, McDonald’s began cooking its fries without trans fat oils.
At the end of the day this is no joke. Twenty-three years ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that no states had an obesity rate of more than 14%.
Today, there are only four states with obesity rates less than 20%.
In the South, the obesity rate averages 27%. That means almost one out of three people are obese. This is not sustainable and it can be slowed beginning with our children.
