February 2013

Americans seem to have gotten the message about avoiding added sugars, but still struggle with the basics of weight gain, according to the latest annual survey by the International Food Information Council Foundation (IFIC). The survey, published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, reported that 70% of consumers are trying to cut down on sugar and 63% on high-fructose corn syrup. Both figures are up over the five-year history of the IFIC survey. So is awareness of trans fats as an ingredient to avoid, now hitting 90%. A puzzling 70% of the 1,000-plus consumers surveyed by IFIC, however, could not correctly identify that "calories in general are what causes weight gain."