Junk Food is Bad for you/Junk Food is Good for you

Lifestyle Relationships
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First theory no 1:

Food watchdog urges action on children’s ‘health timebomb’

By Stefanie Marsh

**BRITAIN is facing a “public health timebomb” with average life expectancy about to fall for the first time in more than a century if nothing is done to halt an epidemic of child obesity.
Lack of exercise and poor diets have produced a generation of children not only prone to more illness than their parents but with shorter life expectancies, the Government’s most senior adviser on food and health has said. **

Sir John Krebs, the chairman of the Food Standards Agency, says that obesity has become one of the nation’s most pressing issues. He urged action to tackle the child nutrition problem, saying: “Doing nothing is not an option.”

Interviewed in a Sunday newspaper, Sir John said that increases in heart disease, type II diabetes and cancer were just some of the side-effects of what has been nicknamed Britain’s “fat plague”.

“What we are faced with is a situation where, if nothing is done to stop the trend, for the first time in 100 years life expectancy will actually go down,” he said.

“That is an extraordinary reversal of the general gains in health. We’re all looking forward to a longer and healthier old age, and that trend could be reversed. So that’s what we are staring at — a public health timebomb which could explode.”

The agency’s recommendations include reducing salt and sugar in children’s food, banning food adverts aimed at pre-school children, stopping vending machines selling only sugary snacks in schools, restricting the amount of advertising of sweets and putting compulsory health warnings on some products. But some consumer groups say that this may not be enough.

The Consumers’ Association, which has long campaigned for clearer labelling on food packaging, said that the Government should not rule out the possibility of a “fat tax” on fast foods, similar to the one imposed on tobacco firms, as well as a ban on cartoon characters on packaging aimed at children.

The group is also calling for all foods to be vetted for their nutritional value by independent scientists before they reach the shelves.

Michelle Smyth, a Consumers’ Association spokeswoman, said: “One of the problems is that consumers are being duped into buying what they think are healthy products which are not in fact healthy at all.

“A so-called ‘healthy’ range of cereals may, for example, claim that it is rich in calcium despite the fact that that claim is actually made on the milk added to the cereal, which is itself loaded with salt and sugar.”

Tackling Britain’s obesity problem has divided politicians, many of whom are reluctant to legislate against big food companies, claiming that re-educating the public about their eating habits should be more of a priority.

Chris Grayling, the Tory health spokesman, said that he was against banning advertising aimed at children. “It’s not regulating against a particular type of advertising to children, it’s that we need to create changes in attitudes,” he said.

“If a product is high in salt there is no reason it shouldn’t say so on the packet but I don’t want to get into situation where we’re seeing skulls and crossbones on food labels.”

A complete ban on television advertising aimed at pre-school children has already been rejected by Tessa Jowell, the Culture Secretary, who has said that it would deprive independent broadcasters of funds for programmes.

**Some sectors in the food industry have already shown signs that they are taking the obesity threat seriously. Sainsbury’s is due to announce that it will begin cutting salt in its foods after evidence that high intake causes a higher death rate. The Government is holding a “salt summit” tomorrow to demand action from food companies such as Heinz, McDonald’s and Birds Eye. **

Figures show that 8.5 per cent of six-year-olds and 15 per cent of 15-year-olds are obese and the Food Standards Agency predicts that obesity will cost the nation about £3.6 billion a year by 2010.

Sir John says that more than half of Britain’s population is currently overweight or obese. He said a debate must be encouraged on what can be done to improve the health of young people.

“We know that the level of obesity in children is rising and, in the words of the Chief Medical Officer, is a health timebomb that could explode,” he said. “Doing nothing is not an option.”

Although his proposals are likely to meet resistance from food manufacturers, Sir John said that he favoured exploring voluntary agreements before proposing legislation forcing companies to act.

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And now theory no. 2 which totally goes against theory no. 1 despite being published in the same paper on the same day :rolleyes:

You pays yer money you takes yer choice. I think I’ll definitely go with theory no. 2.

Is junk food a faddist myth?

By Mick Hume
Some scientists are questioning whether fast food is really bad for us

*JUNK food does not exist, says Professor Stanley Feldman. “Of course, some foods taste better or are more nutritious. But the idea that some contain nothing of value or are harmful is nonsense.”
For Professor Vincent Marks, junk food is “a contradiction in terms. By definition, food is good for you. The only bad food is food that has gone bad. McDonald’s is considered bad, simply because it is wrong for the current fashion.” *

These two views may seem unusual. We are used to warnings about burgers, fizzy drinks and other fast foods, and high fat, sugar and salt content being blamed for an epidemic of obesity, especially among children. The Department of Health has detailed targets for reducing consumption of what it calls “unhealthy foods” (aka junk). One MP has even introduced a Bill to ban junk food adverts from children’s TV. There is also a huge amount of anti-junk food literature, from Eric Schlosser’s investigative Fast Food Nation to the children’s morality tale, The Berenstain Bears and Too Much Junk Food. But much of this orthodoxy is rejected as unscientific by Feldman (from the University of London) and Marks (Surrey University). They carry no banners for the fast-food industry, and it is hard to imagine them eating a double cheeseburger, but they object to what they see as “misinformation” and “propaganda” from the anti-junk food lobby.

*“The idea that any food by itself is harmful is nonsense,” Feldman says. “Meat is not absorbed into the blood stream as Angus beef or Big Macs, but as a variety of amino acids, the same in both meats. Fat enters the bloodstream as fatty acids, and the same ones are produced from good cheese as from fatty meat. *

“In a balanced diet we need a certain amount of protein, fat and carbohydrate. We also need salts. One thing that might be considered as ‘junk food’ is water, since it has no nutritional value, but we can’t survive without a certain amount of that, either.”

Obesity, Feldman thinks, “is not down to one type of food, or to one make of food”. The suggestion that fatty or sugary foods are addictive is “absolute nonsense. They say that these foods release endorphins in the body. Well, a lot of things do that — sex, sunshine, laughing. Are we supposed to ban them as well?”

Marks first upset food faddists when he identified a condition that he called Muesli Belt Malnutrition. He thinks that junk food is “just an emotive, derogatory label that means you don’t approve. My mother thought that baked beans on toast with tomato sauce was junk food. Now we might say it is ideal, lots of antioxidants, fibre and so on.

“Food that is eaten is good for you. I have been trying to get the manufacturers to make ice-cream with all the minerals required for feeding people in hospital, because it is one thing that they will eat.”

Warnings about addictive fast food are “a distortion of the concept of addiction. You might as well say that all food is ‘addictive’, since we keep going back for more, especially the ones we enjoy.”

Marks accepts that “obesity is a big problem. But it is much more complicated than we have imagined, probably with genetic and biological factors. People do need to be educated to understand that while there are no rigid rules, there are general guidelines. But to label these foods as the problem is just to try to find a scapegoat.”

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all i know is that junk food tastes good :smiley: :yummy:

its ok to have it sometimes in moderation i think :smiley:

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confused poms :rolleyes:
eat in moderation is best like irem said..