Scary news about fast food consumption

When I was in high school, like many people, I worked at a McDonald's.

It was a great job for a 17-year-old, mostly because most of my co-workers were the same age and because the number of employees made it easy to get time off if needed.

There was a third benefit: Working at McDonald's made me familiar with the menu and comfortable ordering McDonald's food the rest of my life.

The downside? One of my responsibilities was to wander the parking lot, sweeping up filth and emptying the various garbage cans into a large Dumpster.

Two or three times, I did that job at night with my mind wandering in a way that a teenager's mind wanders. I gathered bags of trash and climbed the mini-ladder to throw them into the Dumpster.

I opened the lid to see a homeless man stand up from inside it, frightened at my interruption as he foraged for warm, thrown-out burgers. We were face to face, both startled.

I didn't scream, but years later, I'm still startled. Just writing it made my adrenaline rush.

But you know what's more startling?

A recent study by the National Center for Health Statistics revealed that 37 percent of American adults said they'd eaten fast food in the past 24 hours.

Every day, more than a third of us eat fast food!

Not surprisingly, the study showed that the appetite for fast food – or at least the consumption of it – decreases as we get older. But not as much as you think.

The study showed that 45 percent of people in their 20s and 30s eat fast food daily. That drops to 24 percent of those 60 and older.

That's right, one-quarter of grandparents (my presumption for people 60 and older) eat fast food.

Every day.

A write for Healthday reported on the study and spoke with a health official.

"Most fast food is not good for our bodies," said Liz Weinandy, a registered dietitian at Ohio State University's Wexner Medical Center.

Next up, Weinandy will say that sharp glass is not good for our skin, acid is not good for our eyes and wearing a mullet is not good for our social standing.

The Healthday article also quoted Melanie Boehmer, a registered dietitian at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City.

"On any given day, over one-third of Americans consume fast food – that's a lot of Big Macs and pizza," she said.

Boehmer not only assessed the study correctly, she identified two of my early jobs. After McDonald's, you see, I worked for years at a pizza parlor. My loyalty to the pizza parlor is such that I don't consider pizza "fast food." I consider it "Italian food."

Anyway, this study is shocking. We all knew fast food was popular and we are familiar with the stereotype of young people lining up to get a Big Mac or Chalupa or Sourdough Jack.

But that one-third of us eat it daily and that one-fourth of people in their 60s do so is stunning.

Had you and I realized that this was coming when we were 17, maybe we would have stayed in fast food.

Just avoid the Dumpsters. They are more scary than a line of seniors at McDonald's.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@hotmail.com.