The L’Abbe Lab is a research group led by Dr. Mary L’Abbe in the Department of Nutritional Sciences at the University of Toronto, studying Food and Nutrition Policy for Population Health Research. The overall goal of this program is to provide an evidence base to support sound public health nutrition policy in areas such as health claims on foods, front-of-pack labelling, children’s marketing on foods, nutritional quality of packaged and restaurant foods, menu labelling, food fortification, food-like natural health products, trans fat, sodium, and sugar.

Research at the L’Abbe Lab has had broad public health and policy impact and media uptake, and has resulted in >50 publications in the last 5 years, most of which are first authored by Dr. L’Abbe’s graduate students and trainees. The Big Life Salt Calculator (2013), an online tool developed in our lab to help consumers assess their personal intakes of sodium, was featured on CBC’s MarketPlace and globally, and is now used in clinical practice (C-CHANGE). The L’Abbe Lab’s research and food supply data has been used by Health Canada, Ontario government, Toronto Public Health, Heart and Stroke Foundation, food industry, WHO/FAO and others to support monitoring, policy development and consumer programs.