fat is back on the menu
Boris has lost twenty-six pounds and admits he was too fat. The Donald is clinically obese and caused concern over the pond. The good news is the coronavirus pandemic has again shone a spotlight on our health and diet. The bad news is we are deluding ourselves if we believe the banning of BOGOF deals, the restriction of pre-watershed junk food ads and the enforcement of calorie-counted restaurant menus are going to make an ouch of difference to our weight and longevity.
We brits, already the fattest nation in western Europe, have gone and put on, on average, another kilo and a bit since March. We have the worst diets and eat proportionally the most ultra-processed food in the whole of Europe. We are literally and metaphorically the biggest snackers and it’s wreaking havoc on our younger generations.
The government’s reluctance to bite the bullet and extend the sugar tax to other sweet products and ultra-processed rubbish is solely due to the intense and partisan lobbying of the rich and powerful food and drink companies, and is not going away anytime soon. Big food has a similarly sized appetite with budgets to match! Without strong government action, and subsequent policy, the disparity between junk and healthy food pricing will shockingly continue to grow. Junk food is cheap but helps Rishi balance the books.
Notwithstanding Marcus Rashford’s surprisingly determined stance in extending free school meals, which will help the most deprived and desperate, more is needed and education is central. In reality, the UK lacks a traditional food culture suited to today’s needs and nutrition, food education per se, should be encouraged from the cradle to a not-so-early grave. My, we could even go the whole hog and make it a compulsory subject, to be taught from nursery school up, and make it as much a priority as the three Rs. Millennials, may need to go Google that last one. Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London, believes primary school kids should start learning about plants and how to grow, cultivate and cook them, from their earliest days, even suggesting MasterChef style inter-school competitions and cook-offs.
Understanding the relationship between agriculture, food production, the environment and our health is essential. Long-time activist, Jamie Oliver, warned only this week against lowering food standards and accused the PM of using “back door” secondary legislation to avoid scrutiny of post-Brexit food standards. More than ever before we need a nationwide curriculum of education, education, education to reverse years of half-baked ideas, bad habits and big food brainwashing.
