Today in I Read This So You Don't Have To is a 216-page report called the Access to Nutrition Index, which details how the largest packaged food companies are doing on a variety of public health measures. There's some interesting stuff. accesstonutrition.org/sites/gl18.atn…
It evaluates companies based on a bunch of things: healthfulness of products, how they market to children, whether they lobby for public health measures, employee wellness programs -- and a lot more.
First, overall rating of the top companies. There's a big difference between the better ones and the worse ones. (Each of the colors is a different aspect of the evaluation.) 
Also big differences in overall healthfulness of each company's product lines. Unsurprisingly, dairy companies do better than soda and confectionary.
An important reminder that, though childhood obesity is on our minds all the time, stunting in young children is still BY FAR the bigger problem.
Overall, nutrition scores improved somewhat from 2016. If you've been following the news on the kinds of products the big companies are acquiring, this will come as no surprise.
And the companies are deriving a larger share of their revenues from more healthful products than they were in 2016.
On marketing, the report looks at whether each company has a responsible policy for all consumers, and for children, and looks at compliance with that policy.
How well are those companies addressing undernutrition (remember that stunting problem)?
And a detailed look at what % of a company's products, and what % of sales, are healthful (defined as scoring 3.5 or better on the index they developed).
The US, UK, New Zealand, and Australia get the most healthful mix of products. China, India, and Mexico, not so much.
Sodium: not going down.
There are other interesting tidbits, but those are what jumped out at me. The moral: big companies are doing better, but we obviously still have huge problems. The question of the role of these companies in improving public health is big and important ...
It's counterintuitive to see them as part of the solution because they've been a big part of the problem. And they can't turn on a dime because people still want Doritos. But I think these changes are significant, and deserve our attention. THE END.
