Coming Together Advertising

I vividly remember the night that I saw the commercial. I had just returned home from an exhausting day at work and I was fully anticipating a relaxing evening. As I sat down on the sofa I picked up the remote and turned the television on. The television was blaring American Idol, not being a fan of the show, I was preparing to change the channel when the commercial came on. It was the commercial that Coca Cola aired as part of their “Coming Together” advertisement which took aim at obesity and basically stated that we are responsible for what we eat and drink, we have choices. The message “all calories count” was received loud and clear. Yes, all calories count, but does it matter where the calories come from and are there some calories that

We are living longer but with more chronic disease which is causing a burden on our health care system. According to Thorpe and Philyaw (2012), health care cost in 2010 consumed 17.6% percent ($2.6 trillion) of gross domestic product in the United States. Research has shown that spending is being influenced by the increasing rate of chronic disease that is directly related to the rise in obesity rates (para. 1). To further complicate this situation (Wang, McPherson, Marsh, Gortmaker, & Brown, 2011) have projected that by 2030 there will be 65 million more obese Americans, the cost to treat preventable diseases associated with obesity are estimated to increase by $48–66 billion per

Bags of snack foods and sugar sweetened beverages that are dispensed from vending machines and sold in grocery stores have also gotten larger and larger. Many have multiple servings in one bag or bottle making it difficult to know how much has actually been consumed. It is very difficult to find a junk food item that is packaged with only one serving inside and this can lead to overeating. Also, serving size is often confused with portion size. Serving size is a standard measure that is used in dietary guidelines, for example an ounce or a cup. Portion size is the amount of any single item of food that is consumed in a single setting of eating. Food labeling helps but it is only effective when people read and understand the label on the package. Many people have trouble discerning what an appropriate portion is and there is little data to recommend techniques to assist people in identifying appropriate serving sizes (Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity,