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A study published Tuesday in Health Affairs suggests that a law requiring New York City restaurant chains to post calorie information has not resulted in an overall decrease in the amount of calories purchased among lower-income city residents, Reuters reports. The law, implemented in July 2008, requires fast food restaurants to post calorie information in large fonts on menu boards. Hailed by health officials as one way to address rising obesity rates, the law has become a model for similar efforts in California, Seattle and other places across the country. To assess how the labeling law influenced consumer behavior, researchers at New York University School of Medicine and Yale University analyzed the fast food purchases of more than 1,100 adults at Burger King, Kentucky Fried Chicken, McDonald's and Wendy's in lower-income areas, both immediately before and one month after the law went into effect. After the labeling requirement began, the percentage of New York City residents aware of the calorie information increased from 16 percent to 54 percent. New York City also saw an increase in the percentage of residents who reported using the information and deciding to purchase items with fewer calories. Nearly 28 percent of purchasers reported seeing the calorie labeling information, and almost 90 percent of this group reported that they purchased fewer calories as a result. However, the researchers found that the number of calories purchased in New York City actually increased slightly, from a mean of 825 calories to 846 calories. The authors concluded that calorie labeling increased the percentage of consumers from lower-income, minority communities who reported seeing calorie labels, and subsequently the number of consumers who reported that the information influenced their food choices. The researchers note that this “could ‘set the stage’ for a larger influence of calorie labeling as time and public policy progress.” Noting that the labeling requirement has not yet affected overall calorie consumption, the researchers suggest that it may take some time before such changes are observed, particularly among the lower-income populations who participated in this study. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the study may have been conducted too soon after the implementation of the ruling and before all fast food restaurants had complied with the requirement. According to Reuters, the city will release its own study in several months using a sample size of 12,000 and covering a range of neighborhoods (Reuters/Yahoo! News, 10/6/09; Elbel et al., Health Affairs, 10/6/09 [subscription required]). (Editor’s Note: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation supported this study through its national program Healthy Eating Research.)