Fast Food Is Destroying America

Fast Food is Destroying America "We provide food that customers love, day after day after day. People just want more of it” (Ray Kroc, Founder of McDonald’s). Coronary Artery Disease is a type of heart disease and the most common cause of heart attacks. Plaque, from eating unhealthy foods, builds up in the arteries, the arteries harden and begin to become narrow and can cause chest pain and heart attacks. “Obesity is a medical condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to the extent that it may have a negative effect on health, leading to reduced life expectancy and/or increased health problems.” The environment is affected by the fast food industry because of the amount of pollution and trash they produce on a daily basis. The fast

Koa Halpern indicates “The process depletes our natural resources as well as the air-giving trees.” (parag. 8). The types of materials fast food restaurants use are styrofoam, plastic, paper, and cardboard. Styrofoam is non-biodegradable and non-recyclable and releases fumes that are toxic when burned. Plastic is also non-biodegradable and releases fumes that are toxic when burned. Fifty-five square feet of a rainforest is sacrificed due to the making of every time a quarter pound patty is sold in fast food restaurants. Katelyn Walton explains “The bags, wrappers, napkins, boxes, styrofoam containers, plastic-ware, etc; is the primary source of urban litter in the United States” (parag. 3). Twenty percent of litter is fast food packaging and another twenty percent is added to count for chips, drinks, candy, and other snacks. Since styrofoam is non-biodegradable and non-recyclable, it can take nine hundred years to decay in a landfill. Companies are littering, making it harder to clean up in the long run and they are causing climate changes and global warming to get worse. Processed foods at factory farms affect the quality of the environment and the animals living within it. The meat produced at factory farms which raises global warming risks and the transportation of food products which increases poor air quality. The Food Empowerment Project asserts “...Millions of acres of forest are clear-cut every year to manufacture fast food packaging” (parag. 13). A landmark report says that the livestock sector is the biggest threat to the environment. Fast food packaging counts for about one-fifth of litter in landfills. Fast food companies also use toxic chemicals to prevent grease leakages, and they coat their paper products with perfluoroalkyls which ends up diminishing the environment. Certainly, fast food affects the