A new food-ranking system called the Overall Nutrition Quality Index (ONQI) is about to make your grocery shopping a healthier or more confusing experience, depending on whom you ask. The ONQI is already in many stores and will debut nationwide this spring. Later this year, the ratings of about 50,000 foods and food products will be available online.
But I'm not convinced it will help any of us make better food choices.
The ONQI is based on evaluating some 30 different nutrients and dividing the good (vitamins, minerals, protein, phytonutrients, etc.) by the bad (saturated fat, cholesterol, sodium, added sugars, glycemic load, etc.). The end result is a formula that scores a product based on its nutrition facts and some other nuances that help shape a healthy diet.
The scientists who developed the ONQI—including David Katz, MD, a preventive medical expert at Yale University—hope that when we shop and can see how a food scores on a scale of 1 to 100 (1 being basically junk and 100 being the most virtuous), we will make healthier choices. A food's score might be placed on the store shelf right where you get its price. Says Dr. Katz, ONQI is the nutrition-based GPS system for navigating food choices."
While the scores are not "officially" available, nor are they published in any scientific journals to date, here's a sneak preview of some of the scores that are either available on the ONQI website or have been published by trade associations.
| Food | ONQI Scores |
|---|---|
|
Fresh strawberries |
100 |
|
Raw spinach |
100 |
|
Raw broccoli |
100 |
|
Orange |
100 |
|
Skim milk |
91 |
|
Plain oatmeal |
88 |
|
Walnuts |
82 |
|
Almonds |
82 |
|
1% lowfat milk |
81 |
|
Pretzels |
1 |
|
Soda |
1 |
|
Taffy |
1 |
ONQI sounds good in theory, but I've yet to find a client who doesn't know that soda and chips aren't as healthy as strawberries and skim milk. In fact, I find that most people understand completely which foods are best for them—the bigger challenge is motivating them to make those healthier choices.
If I'm wrong, please tell me. I'd love to hear how these nutrition scoring systems are working at your supermarket.
