Now that we are firmly in 2007, and being bombarded by both the media and Nanny into detoxing and taking diets, it is worth sitting back and considering exactly what constitutes being fat actually means.Indeed Nanny is so keen on fat issues that she wants to set up a database to monitor every child in the country, including their diet.
Yet some health researchers argue that being overweight is actually beneficial: it's the dieting that kills.
In Septicland, the land that gave us WMD in Iraq, no less a person that the US surgeon general has claimed that obesity is "a greater threat than weapons of mass destruction".
Errmmm...is anyone buying that hyperbole?
Nanny needless to say, as she follows all things American, is eager to jump on the bandwagon. Nanny wants to introduce a £224M "Children's Index".
What the fark is a "Children's Index" then Ken?
I will tell you...
A "Children's Index" is a database of every child in the country, that will chart progress from birth to adulthood and will flag up "concerns" about each child's development.
Two "flags" on a child's record will trigger an official investigation into his or her family.
Interestingly Nanny's Information Commissioner, in a report issued in November, is very critical of the scheme.
Quote:
"Government policy proposes treating all parents
as if they cannot be trusted to bring up their children."
Seemingly, one of the proposed danger signs on the Children's Index would be if the child were not eating the Nanny approved amount of fruit and vegetables each day.
Yet there is no scientific evidence to support the fat myths propgated by the media, Nanny and the diet food industry.
- The recently published Health Survey for England, 2004 shows no significant increase in the weight of children in recent years. The Department of Health report found that from 1995 to 2003 there was only a one-pound increase in children's average weight.
- The Thousand Families Study found little connection between overweight children and adult obesity. In the study, four out of five obese people became obese as adults, not as children.
- In the US it is estimated that 10% of high school pupils suffer from eating disorders, brought about by the incessant media message that slim is good and fat is bad.
- In 2004, a World Health Organisation study of British pupils found that overweight children ate sweets less frequently than normal weight children did. Children who ate larger amounts of junk food actually had less chance of being overweight.
- In America there was a rapid increase in the number of overweight people in the early years of this decade. However, that is because the goal posts were moved! The classification of what was "overweight" was reduced from those with a body mass index of 27, to those of 25.
- In 2005 a US Centres for Disease Control study found the lowest death rates among overweight people.
- A 2004 Harvard University study examined 14,000 children, and found that junk food did not lead to obesity.
- 95% of dieters are fatter five years after their diet then when they started to trim.
- The Iowa Women's Health Study and the American Cancer Society study found that weight loss was associated with higher rates of mortality.
In Septicland, the land that gave us WMD in Iraq, no less a person that the US surgeon general has claimed that obesity is "a greater threat than weapons of mass destruction".
ReplyDeleteDoes that mean they'll be ready for lunch in 45 minutes?
On a serious note, will the children of the "rich and famous/policitians" be on this list?
ReplyDeleteThey are really determined to get this DNA database up and running, whatever they have to call it.
ReplyDeleteAndy, if they were going to look at the 'rich & famous' surely Kate Moss and various other known drug users would have had a visit from the Social Services by now.
ReplyDeleteI'm already on 'the list', as my health vistor 'dobbed me in' and told the SS my house was untidy (I hadn't done my ironing and it was in a bit pile in the corner) and we didn't eat at the table (we're scum who eat from plates on their laps,) My children are - if anything - under weight so I will be done for that... and once my autistic son starts school they'll be round to take them all off of me!
Home schooling is looking more and more like a real option.
my weight is weird. For a whole year I was eating nothing but pizza for dinner everyday and I stayed at 12 stone for the whole year. I thought it's about time I started to lose weight so I decided to have sandwiches for breakfast and sandwiches for dinner. Amazingly I wasn't hungry at tea time but I have been eating the sandwiches for 2 years and I have gained 1 and a half stone.
ReplyDeleteI usually don't eat cake or sweet either except in late december and january when I m still eating the cakes from christmas and the sweets as my present.
I plan on going to a gym this year.
There is no point in having a DNA database as it is clear that we must all be the same - identical - clones. If not how could Nanny expect the same solutions to work for everyone's apparent health problems?
ReplyDeleteMy late aunt was very ill as a child having caught Scarlet Fever. It ruined her eyesight for one thing. Through life she was always generously proportioned though not especially overweight. However she had a very very low pulse rate and thus provied to be a challenge to the medical fraternity.
Latish in life she was diagnosed with some blood pressure problems and was advised that here diet was partly to blame. She ate little on a daily basis, rarely drank anything but water and the occasional cup of black coffee unless there were visitors or she was herself visiting others, when a normal intake was taken. It was just her way. It may have had something to do with suffering a lot from migraines through most of her adult life.
It was this lake of food that was blamed for her being over weight. So she was given a diet that provided greater food value and, sure enough, she lost about 3 stone. Stayed that way for a few years until she decided she was old enough that it did not matter any more.
The theory was that by under eating, through habit rather than intent, her metabolism had decided to retain all that it could all the time. So it let nothing go, storing it all as fat and water. By eating more, especially potatoes and carbohydrates, the body became less retentive and allowed her weight to fall.
Whether the theory was right or not I have no idea but it seemed to work as planned during the time the attention to diet was active.
Government action should be very much limited to offering good advice, making sure food products are of a reasonable health quality negotiating general standards with foreign suppliers.
Anything else should be left to the individual.
i feel obesity in children is usually the parents fault and if the parents feed there children fatty foods then the kids get in the habit of eating it and just feel its a routine.
ReplyDelete