Eating healthy, losing weight and keeping the weight off is something all of us struggle with. Who wants to eat healthy when pizza and bacon taste so good? Well when you know how many calories are in those two delicious foods you’ll want to change your ways and it may be easier to do than you think. Carnegie Mellon University and an insurance company in Louisville, Kentucky have teamed up to create an app that helps you count calories in a very creative way.
The app shows menus from restaurants and the calories for each item. It will either show the exact number or show a red, green or yellow light. This traffic light model is easy to use, green is lower calories, yellow is a few more and red is stop no go. Carnegie Mellon did a study with the employees of the insurance company.
The employees were given the app and the study showed that ten percent of the 250 participants ordered the lower calorie or green light option. Knowing is half the battle, some people in the study never knew how unhealthy the food they were ordering was. That is easily the case for a majority of Americans. They do not know how many calories are in the food they are eating. An app like this will definitely help the public to eat healthier. The FDA is also set to release new calorie labeling regulations next spring which will also help
Another thing that makes it tough is that some restaurants make it hard to find out many calories are in each dish they make. With the app and the new labeling regulations the government and private companies are making it much easier for Americans to eat healthier and know what it is that they are eating.
