In the Community

October 10, 2007

'The Amazing Food Detective' Makes It Big in the Big Apple

It's official: The Amazing Food Detective has made it in New York, New York.

Kaiser Permanente's recently launched online video game "The Incredible Adventures of the Amazing Food Detective" was featured Oct. 8 in the primetime news broadcast of NY1, a 24-hour television news channel serving New York City and parts of New Jersey and Connecticut.

NY1 conducted an in-studio interview with Ray Baxter, PhD, Kaiser Permanente's senior vice president for community benefit, for the video and online report.

"We've got about 9 million young people right now in this country who are overweight; 75 percent of them are going to be obese adults and they are going to be at high risk for diabetes, cancer, heart attack, stroke and other chronic diseases," Baxter said. "We need to get to them while their behaviors are being shaped."

Distributed in a partnership with Scholastic Inc., "The Amazing Food Detective" shows children how to make better food choices and get more active. Children playing the game follow the routines of eight culturally diverse children whose activities or conditions would benefit from healthy food and exercise choices. The game, aimed at children ages 9-10 and available to everyone at http://www.amazingfooddetective.com, complements Kaiser Permanente's nationally recognized childhood obesity clinical strategy.

The game automatically shuts off after 20 minutes of activity, and encourages children playing the game to walk away from the screen and exercise. The game remains locked for 60 minutes after that automatic shut-off function.

View an online recording of the coverage through NY1's website (requires RealPlayer).

The NY1 coverage follows closely on a feature in USA Today in which a games reviewer gave Amazing Food Detective nine out of 10 stars.

Read more about The Amazing Food Detective through this earlier coverage in the KP News Center.