This is a huge move forward for people’s health. It will encourage people to walk more, even if it means getting off one stop earlier. I am going to make sure all London’s health interest groups like ramblers, London Walking and the Mayors initiative to get people walking and news outlets, know about it.
Hopefully they can add further help in the information pop up. For example as a 7 1/2 stone/105lbs/48 kg, 5’1" tall, slow walker, I know most online calculators show double the calories that I use. I just checked my pedometer and I use 26 calories per km. My friend who is twice my weight and 6’ tall uses twice my cals so the google calculations will be spot on for him ie for 13 or so stone. So for now people will just need to establish what percentage they are. In future google could include the average person weight so people can calculate and perhaps a high weight and low weight like mine. It doesn’t need to be exact, just enough so people don’t get disappointed with it.
Thanks agin google.
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I am very unhappy with the inclusion of the calorie count. It is insensitive to those with eating disorders, many of who exercise too much and whose health can be harmed by exposure to this information. If this feature rolls out further, it is important to make sure that users need to opt in to this feature, rather than seeing health information when they are only interested in directions.
Cultural obsession over calories is unhealthy, and it is distressing to me that Google Maps would help fuel this further.
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I am incredibly disappointed in Google’s decision to create this feature without giving people the option to opt-out. It should, in fact, be an opt-in only feature. If people like it and want to use it, fine, but their pleasure should not be at the expense of those of us for whom this kind of information is actually detrimental to our health.
Yes, hopefully they can make it optional. For myself, after a whole 60 year lifetime of obesity, on diets, using a calorie app where I can review my intake and output has helped me maintain a healthy weight at half the weight I was, for the past 5 years. I do agree being obsessed with calories isn’t healthy, but for me it has helped lead me to less processed foods ( but ALL FOODS included as wanted, in appropriate portions), increased excercise and identify a good weight for me, because I had never had the choice or experience of a healthy weight before. I also had to use this process to put on weight after an illness, and I had a tiny insight to people who fear weight gain (will I go back to overeating? learn to want more, how much fat /muscle to add, all things I had never experienced before and now glad I have had this positive experience). Whether people want/need to lose, gain, maintain weight, people seek a certain level of control after years of being ‘out of control’ and can easily latch onto all sorts of extreme ways of doing this from any kind of diet that excludes any food, extreme clean eating etc, staving, over exercising and in today’s market where manufacturers hide calories in cheap sugar and fat additives at high levels it can be confusing for anyone. I totally agree, and have had experience of maintaining weight just by listening to ones body’s hunger/contentment signal but it can be corrupted over time by slowly increased over or under eating if we fall back into years of old comfortable habits, so one does need to be mindful of this, so for some people, a calorie check may help reassess where one is. I know I still love the feeling of fullness over contentment so have had to use the calorie app to change To better foods that gives me this feeling in a healthy way, while maintaining a healthy weight. Perhaps it’s not so much the calorie watching that is as harmful as the low amount of calories that one believes one deserves/needs. But, since I am not an expert, I bow to your knowledge and agree that having it as an option, if it is used, would be best for us all. All the best, Shirley
Forgot to add, the most importent part of my experience was the digital biofeedback given by the app MyFitnessPal which finally helped me sort out all the confusing details of weight loss and more importantly maintains it. Whenever I felt I may have overeaten, or felt hungry for no reason, checking what I had entered into the app helped reassure me that there was a reason or that I could simply adjust things - ie understandable control and reassurance that listening to my body works, mindless eating doesn’t. So, in the same way, I think the digital feedback that Google calories feedback will help many people like me see that everyday little excursions can contribute to a healthy life.