Our Epi-Aid (the term that CDC uses for urgent field investigations) of healthful nutrition offerings in National Parks has begun! To give a bit of background: the National Park Service (NPS) is starting an initiative called Healthy Parks Healthy People (first started in Canada) – which includes the use of parks as places for promotion of healthy nutrition, physical activity and mental health. NPS contacted our supervisor at CDC to assist with a baseline assessment of the healthfulness of food and beverages served to visitors at national parks (over 280 million visitors per year – one of the biggest tourist attractions in the US!). Based on other survey tools of the nutrition environment (for use in restaurants, stores, etc) – we created instruments that can be used at stores, restaurants, snack shops and vending machines in the parks. The surveys are completely observational (we don’t have to talk to anyone – making them simple to perform) – and only take 10-30 minutes per survey. Once we test the tools on this 3 week pilot study, we plan to use them in a survey of 50+ parks in September. The pilot study that we just started includes 12 national parks in 7 states (New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina). We hope that you enjoy our stories from this Epi-Aid adventure.
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