EChO - Eradicate Childhood Obesity Foundation, Inc. is a

501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, Trust (business), trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of ...

public charity based in

Cambridge, MA Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 U.S. census was 118, ...

dedicated to ending

childhood obesity Childhood obesity is a condition where excess adipose tissue, body fat negatively affects a child's health or well-being. As methods to determine body fat directly are difficult, the diagnosis of obesity is often based on Body mass index, BMI. ...

. Established in 2015, the foundation aims to promote healthier lifestyles through the use of nutrition education, technology, and novel, easy-to-understand food labels.

History

Founder and President Laurent Adamowicz established EChO - Eradicate Childhood Obesity Foundation, Inc. in 2015 with researchers and public health advocates Dr. George Blackburn
Dr. Steven Heymsfield
Eric Rimm, and Pastor Raymond Jetson. The foundation aims to create innovative solutions to combat childhood obesity and help children build healthier lives by spreading awareness of the dangers of added sugar consumption. Adamowicz and Jetson are 2011 Senior Fellows of the Advanced Leadership Initiative at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

. Since its establishment, EChO has created initiatives focused on decreasing the consumption of

processed foods Food processing is the transformation of agricultural products into food, or of one form of food into other forms. Food processing takes many forms, from grinding grain into raw flour, home cooking, and complex industrial methods used in the mak ...

containing added sugars, a proven contributor to childhood obesity. In 2019, EChO became a partner of the National Salt and Sugar Reduction Initiative (NSSRI).

Board of Directors and Executives

* Dr. George L. Blackburn, director (2015-2017) * Dr. Steven Heymsfield, director * Kathy McManus, director * Raymond Jetson, vice president, director * Laurent Adamowicz, president and founder

The Added Sugar Repository

The Added Sugar Repository (ASR) was launched by EChO as an open source, collaborative project in 2018. The ASR is an exhaustive list that aims to contain all names of added sugar that are found to be used in food and beverage products throughout the United States. The repository was made to allow consumers to have information on what is

added sugar Added sugars or free sugars are sugar carbohydrates (caloric sweeteners) added to food and beverages at some point before their consumption. These include added carbohydrates ( monosaccharides and disaccharides), and more broadly, sugars nat ...

and the different forms used by the food industry. The Added Sugar Repository is supported by Robert Lustig and his Sugar Project.

SugAR Poke

In June 2017, EChO- Eradicate Childhood Obesity Foundation, Inc. partnered with Pandora Reality to release a novel diet app, "SugAR Poke", free on

iPhone The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at ...

and Android. SugAR Poke is the first public health app to utilize

augmented reality Augmented reality (AR), also known as mixed reality (MR), is a technology that overlays real-time 3D computer graphics, 3D-rendered computer graphics onto a portion of the real world through a display, such as a handheld device or head-mounted ...

(AR) technology, helping consumers make healthier food choices with better knowledge of added sugar. The demo app scans front labels of popular salad dressings to provide consumers with real-time added sugar content by superimposing an added-sugar front label on the bottle. A green label means that there is no added sugar in the product. A black label appears over the product if it contains added sugar, displaying the number of teaspoons of added sugar in the entire bottle. Founder and President Laurent Adamowicz introduced SugAR Poke at th
AR in Action
Conference at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...

, followed by the launch of a

Kickstarter Kickstarter, PBC is an American Benefit corporation, public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York City, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative project ...

campaign to allow for full development of the app. Eventually, the fully developed app will include all processed foods sold in the United States and a gaming component to better educate children on the dangers of added sugar.

Other Initiatives

Added Sugar Front Label Initiative and Study

The Added Sugar Front Label Initiative proposes

front labels displaying the quantity of added sugar in processed goods. This aims to decrease consumption of added sugar and prevent childhood obesity.The Influence of Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Health Warning Labels on Parents’ Choices Christina A. Roberto, Diandra Wong, Aviva Musicus, David Hammond Pediatrics Jan 2016, peds.2015-3185; DOI: 10.1542/peds.2015-3185 A research component to the initiative will pilot-test added sugar labels to prove the ability to influence food-purchasing behavior via a large-scale study conducted at food retailers and/or public school vending machines in the

Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

area.

Principal Investigators for Added Sugar Front Label Study

* Rania Mekary, MSc, Ph.D.
Christina A. Roberto
Ph.D.

Universal Cooking and Nutrition Education (U-CANE)

EChO - Eradicate Childhood Obesity Foundation, Inc. is an avid promoter of cooking and nutrition education for all, especially children. EChO launched the Universal Cooking and Nutrition Education (U-CANE) movement to encourage the U.S. public school system to reform their curriculum to include mandatory cooking and nutrition classes from kindergarten to medical school.

References

{{reflist 501(c)(3) organizations