New York's public hospitals serve plant-based meals by default
In March, NYC Health + Hospitals' 11 campuses started offering plant-based chef's specials for lunch. Now, it's expanding that plant-forward shift to include dinner. At Lincoln, Metropolitan, and Woodhull Hospitals, culturally diverse, plant-based meals are the primary dinner options. Vegan menu items are default, with meat and dairy offered as options.
Dishes include Southern black-eyed pea casserole with corn bread, sancocho (a Caribbean stew with tubers and roots) and arroz con gandules y calabaza (rice with pigeon peas and squash).
NYC Health + Hospitals is the largest municipal health care system in the US, providing services to more than one million New Yorkers annually. In addition to serving meat-free meals for inpatients, NYCHH also runs a 'Plant-Based Lifestyle Medicine Program' for people with diabetes, prediabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease or health concerns related to obesity.
Trend Bite
Along with improving patient outcomes and decreasing carbon emissions, going plant-based is also expected to reduce costs. Sodexo, the hospitals' food service provider, anticipates that serving vegan meals by default will save USD 1 million annually when implemented at all 11 of the system's hospitals.
Behavioral nudges like creating a healthier default are effective strategies to help people change their diets. Taking it broader, which norms can your organization flip to prompt your audience to make better choices?
