Fast Foods have not gotten that much Healthier, Report Says

Over the years, fast food restaurants have worked hard to revamp their menus to include healthier options. In a new report, researchers from Tufts University set out to examine whether or not eating fast food today is, in fact, a healthier option than it was before. According to the report, fast food is ultimately still bad for you.

For this study, the researchers looked at 27 menu items that were sold at three fast-food chain restaurants that the researchers did not name. The food items included cheeseburgers, French fries, grilled chicken sandwiches and non-diet sodas. The researchers concluded that average calorie, saturated fat and sodium levels remained pretty much the same over 18-years.

They found that eight of the items had fewer calories in 2013 than they did in 1996. However, nine food offerings had more calories than they did before. Furthermore, seven out of 18 food options had more sodium content whereas only five had less. Trans fat in general declined over time. The team stated that this trend was most likely due to the changes in frying fat.

"There is a perception that restaurants have significantly expanded their portion sizes over the years, but the fast food we assessed does not appear to be part of that trend," study lead investigator, Alice Lichtenstein, director of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Cardiovascular Nutrition Laboratory and professor at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, said reported by WebMD.

The researchers noted that the calorie count of similar food items sold at the three restaurants varied as well. An order of small French fries at one location was about 110 calories more than the same order of fries sold at another place. Other nutritional values that differed for similar items between restaurants were sodium content and trans fat.

"Restaurants can help consumers by downsizing portion sizes and reformulating their food to contain less of these overconsumed nutrients. This can be done, gradually, by cutting the amount of sodium, and using leaner cuts of meat and reduced-fat cheese," Lichtenstein said. "From what we hear, some fast food chains are heading in that direction and also introducing new healthier options. If taken advantage of, these changes should help consumers adhere to the current dietary recommendations."

The study was published in Preventing Chronic Disease.