You and I and pretty much every American know what Super Bowl Sunday is. Some watch for the game, some watch for the halftime show, and some watch to see what edgy advertising Doritos will air.
Regardless of which group you may fall into, we all see the commercials.
And those advertising food and drinks don’t exactly agree with the diet our doctors would recommend.
Research published in JAMA Network Open, a scientific journal of the American Medical Association, found that commercials played during 10 televised National Football League games often advertised food that is poor in nutrition.
There were 102 food-related commercials during those 10 games, which took place in September and November 2023. Among the advertised products, the median sodium content was 910 milligrams per serving.
The American Heart Association recommends most adults ideally stay under 1,500 mg of sodium per day. However, Americans typically consume about 3,500 mg daily. It’s not hard when one serving of popular marketed snacks contains more than half the recommended daily intake.
The median calories per serving of the advertised food products was 490 calories, but some products contained up to 1,400 calories.
It can be hard to make healthy choices when much of what’s presented to consumers doesn’t have healthy nutritional value. And these football games receive a massive viewership.
Last year, the Super Bowl amassed 124 million viewers and earned itself the title of the most watched single telecast in TV history.
But the unhealthy food commercials aren’t restricted to just Super Bowl Sunday, as the study’s methodology demonstrates.
NFL games are televised three times a week during the regular season, which runs for 18 weeks a year.
“It’s been a slow growth in how much emphasis is being put on the fact that our environment really shapes a lot of our food decisions and trying to reduce a little bit of the sort of finger wagging that we put on the individual,” chair of the American Heart Association’s Lifestyle Nutrition Committee, Maya Vadiveloo, told the Cardiovascular Research Foundation while discussing this new study.
“I’m not saying that the individual doesn’t need to exert different forms of self-control and educate themselves, but we’re asking them to do an awful lot in an environment that’s really pushing the opposite,” she said.
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