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Retail food environment linked to obesity prevalence in racially disparate counties

Retail food environment accounted for a proportion of the gap in adult obesity prevalence in counties with differing proportions of black residents, according to research published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

"Significant associations between retail food environment disparities and racial composition of community residents have been documented in the scientific literature, with several studies observing that neighborhoods with a higher proportion of [black] residents are more likely to experience reduced access to outlets that retail healthy foods (ie, grocery stores) or increased access to outlets that retail unhealthy food (ie, fast-food restaurants) compared with areas with a lower proportion of [black] residents," Chelsea R. Singleton, PhD, MPH, Institute for Health Research and Policy, University of Illinois at Chicago, and colleagues wrote.

The researchers analyzed data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Environment Atlas and the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System from 3,135 counties in the United States between 2009 and 2010. Food environment measures were taken from the U.S. Census Bureau County Business Patterns. Singleton and colleagues included the following retail food outlets: supercenters, convenience stores, grocery stores, full-service restaurants, farmers markets, fast-food restaurants, specialized food stores and community-supported agriculture farms.

Results demonstrated an obesity prevalence of 29.63% in counties with a lower proportion of black residents and 32.98% in counties with a higher proportion of black residents. Singleton and colleagues reported that mean differences in retail food environment accounted for 0.46 units of the 3.35 percentage point difference, which translated to 13.81% of the gap in adult obesity prevalence between the county types.

"Although findings from the current study suggest that adult obesity prevalence may be reduced in high-[black population] counties if provided a similar food environment as low-[black population] counties, conclusions cannot be drawn because the conducted analyses provide no insight to the causal relationship between retail food environment and obesity," Singleton and colleagues wrote. "However, this research does contribute valuable information to current scientific knowledge of the association between food environment variation and race — scientific knowledge that may have important efforts at the state and national levels." – by Chelsea Frajerman Pardes

Disclosures: The authors report no relevant financial disclosures.