Washington, DC – If you live, work, or shop in an area with high commercial activity, you might want to enjoy one last lunch at your favorite local restaurant, because the food police want to close it down. A study released today in the American Journal of Public Health looks at restaurant locations in the Chicago area and suggests they are located too closely to schools and should, therefore, face strict zoning restrictions.
“This study emphatically does not show fast food outlets intentionally locating near schools,” said Dan Mindus, senior analyst for The Center for Consumer Freedom. “All this study indicates is that restaurants are likely to be found in areas of high commercial activity—the same places you might find a bank, a clothing store, a grocery chain, or a gas station. Restaurants locate where people work and shop. According to this study, when schools aren’t in commercial areas, they’re not likely to be close to a fast food restaurant.”
Zoning restrictions on restaurants are just the latest example of a broad agenda to restrict what Americans eat and drink. This agenda also includes taxation and litigation.
In the study’s conclusion, the authors compare fast food to the danger of guns to minors. Given legal precedents with regard to “firearms vendors,” the study suggests the government should “impose stricter controls on fast-food restaurant sites.”
“Suggesting that a cheeseburger poses the same danger to a child as a gun shows pretty clearly that the food police have gone too far,” Mindus said. “Instead of zoning restrictions on restaurants, there should be publishing restrictions on bogus studies that are simply propaganda pieces in support of radical regulations.”
To learn more about obesity myths, read the report “An Epidemic of Obesity Myths” at www.consumerfreedom.com.
