The economic benefits of fruit and vegetable consumption in Canada

Abstract

OBJECTIVES:The objectives of this study were to determine the proportion of the population that meets or exceeds Canada's Food Guide (CFG) recommendations regarding the number of daily servings of fruits and vegetables (F/V), to assess trends in this proportion between 2000 and 2013, to estimate the annual economic burden attributable to inadequate F/V consumption within the context of other important risk factors, and to estimate the short-and long-term costs that could be avoided if modest improvements were made to F/V consumption in Canada. METHODS:We used a previously developed methodology based on population-attributable fractions and a prevalence-based cost-of-illness approach to estimate the economic burden associated with low F/V consumption. RESULTS:Over three quarters of Canadians are not meeting CFG recommendations regarding the number of daily servings of F/V, leading to an annual economic burden of $4.39 billion. If a 1% relative increase in F/V consumption occurred annually between 2013 and 2036, the cumulative reduction in economic burden over the 23-year period would reach $8.4 billion. Consumption levels of F/V, and the resulting economic burden, varied by sex, age and province.CONCLUSION: A significant majority of Canadians are not consuming the recommended daily servings of F/V, with important consequences to their health and the Canadian economy. Programs and policies are required to encourage F/V consumption in Canada.KEY WORDS: Economic burden of disease; populations at risk; risk factors; fruit and vegetable consumption La traduction du résumé se trouve à la fin de l'article.

Temporal changes in diet quality and the associated economic burden in Canada

“…To our knowledge, this is the first study in Canada that has estimated the economic burden of unhealthy eating using a measure which assesses whole diet quality [ 16 ]. Various others studies had considered single dietary components [ 18 , 19 , 21 , 23 , 26 ]. To our knowledge, this is also the first study that has assessed temporal changes in the economic burden of the consumption of poor quality diets using the 2004 and 2015 CCHS Nutrition data.…”

“…This may have led to an underestimation of the economic burden of unhealthy eating. In addition, the underestimation may also be due to the fact that we restricted our cost estimation to costs associated with treatment and management of chronic diseases without including costs related to other health professional (other than physicians) expenditures and other health care expenditures which have been included in other related Canadian studies [ 23 , 47 ]. Indeed, if we make similar assumptions of including other costs not allocated in the EBIC tool as done by Krueger et al (2015) [ 47 ] in their estimation of economic burden attributable to physical inactivity ($10.8 billion), excess body weight ($23.3 billion) and tobacco smoking ($18.7 billion), unhealthy eating would cost around 50% higher (i.e.…”

“…We then calculated the relative risks for other quintiles assuming a linear dose-response relationship. This assumption was applied by Krueger et al (2017) [ 23 ] to estimate the relative risks of other categories using the relative risks expressed in terms of highest (quintile 5) versus the lowest one (quintile 1). We calculated HEI-C 2010 scores combining males and females for age groups 2–3 years, 4–8 years, 9–13 years, and sex-specific scores for age-groups 14–18 years, 19–50 years, and ≥51 years, according to Canada’s Food Guide [ 15 ].…”

“…Cost of illness studies are a resource used by policy and decision makers to help understand the economic burden of chronic disease associated with different risk factors [ 17 ]. However, few studies have estimated the economic burden of overall diet quality but instead have focused on single foods or nutrients [ 18 – 23 ]. Of the studies that have focused on diet quality, a few different approaches have been used.…”

Diet quality and risk factors for cardiovascular disease among South Asians in Alberta

“…diabetes, and CVD risks in vegetarians are similar to nonvegetarian SAs and comparable or even excessive relative to people from Western countries (Ahmed and El-Menyar 2014). The majority of our participants were vegetarian, and their daily vegetable and fruit consumption was 7.5 servings, which is greater than the 4.4 servings/day of the general Canadian population (Krueger et al 2017). Despite a high vegetable and fruit intake, participants had poor micronutrient intake.…”