Maine to Consider Putting Calories on Chain Restaurant Menus and Menu Boards


Today Maine House Speaker Hannah Pingree introduced a bill to require menu labeling at chain restaurants. Below is a statement by CSPI Nutrition Policy Director Margo G. Wootan.

February 24, 2009

I hope this year Maine will join New York City, Philadelphia, Portland, OR, and the state of California in passing menu labeling for chain restaurants. If McDonald's, Subway, and Applebee's can provide New Yorkers with nutrition information, shouldn't they do the same for Mainers?

People should be provided the nutritional price for what they're ordering as well as the financial price. Otherwise how can they know that a bagel with cream cheese has more calories than two jelly donuts at Dunkin’ Donuts? Menu labeling is a popular, low-cost way to help make a dent in the obesity epidemic and save valuable health dollars in these tough economic times.

It now seems hard to believe that not long ago Nutrition Facts labels weren't required on food packages in the grocery store. Similarly, a few years from now, it will be hard to imagine that standardized nutrition information was absent from chain restaurant menus.

 

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