tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52304680161634188592011-11-27T16:15:34.786-08:00A commentary on the ever-expanding problem of child obesity - the problems, the pitfalls, and possible solutions.Judynoreply@blogger.comBlogger311100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-48859811527773335642011-04-22T06:13:00.000-07:002011-04-22T06:33:06.285-07:00

Quite stunning to believe that chiefs at Manchester Metropolitan University tried to ban a fruit stall from operating outside their premises, saying it was an eyesore. In a city which has an obesity record to rival that of the United States, the suggestion that the stall was an "eyesore" is beyond belief. There are lots of words to describe fruit stalls in the UK: unusual, done-away-with, no

Judynoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-45463153098138832692010-12-08T03:52:00.000-08:002010-12-08T04:04:56.884-08:00

It's quite rare to see England topping any charts these days. Eurovision Song Contest, World Cup, Hosting the World Cup, are all passing by. Even the economy continues to spiral downwards. There is one chart however, which England looks close to topping and where the trends are ever-upwards: the obesity charts. Data from the OECD shows that in the obesity stakes, England is a European

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-62647492157249339482010-03-03T00:39:00.000-08:002010-03-07T13:30:06.663-08:00

If your bathroom scales accelerate faster than your car, you will enjoy a BBC Three programme in the "Mischief" series called: "Who Made Me Fat"?It's made by the same team who which delved into food contents, and heart attack fats and is fronted by Becca Wilcox.Becca should be up there with all those diet goddesses and fitness divas because she said the most sensible thing about weight for a

Judynoreply@blogger.com39tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-61706434181918483482009-11-10T15:21:00.000-08:002009-11-10T15:35:22.960-08:00

Doing for Lidl what Morgan Spurlock did for McDonalds is BBC Three's Alex Riley. The seemingly unassuming Riley fronts a not-for-the-faint-hearted programme titled: "Britain's Most Disgusting Foods".If by chance you are able to watch these programmes - and the meat and fish episodes are particularly testing - you may be forgiven for thinking they are all a bit of a laugh.The graphics, the pace

Judynoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-60506022465377676912009-11-04T04:32:00.000-08:002009-11-04T04:41:50.428-08:00

After the recent Hallowe'en sugarfest comes a new report that revises recent trends on child obesity. It now seems that things aren't going to be quite a big in the future as they were supposed to be.The statistics were almost too horrendous to contemplate as they stood, with over half the nation's children predicted to be overweight in less than a decade.The future was looking fat, very fat,

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-1424963720802850742009-10-15T06:15:00.000-07:002009-10-15T06:23:55.967-07:00

I suppose on the surface, a frozen, plastic-wrapped pizza shouldn't be at all healthy. Too much sugar in the tomatoes, too much salt & fast in the dough and probably too much cheese. It's nice to convince yourself; even if it's just for the sake of convenience, that it's not that bad. Now I know differently. A programme on TV last week which maddeningly escapes me, showed the whle sorry saga.What

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-15198139477930080552009-07-27T05:13:00.001-07:002009-07-27T05:21:28.068-07:00

A staggering item for the silly season about coffee. Next time you grab a quick one on your way to work and think about treating yourself with something slightly more "indulgent" than the skinny latte think hard.The World Cancer Research Fund has warned that some brands of iced coffee have more calories than an average evening meal.The list in full looks something like this:StarbucksVenti dark

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-24183108409264586782009-05-08T02:24:00.000-07:002009-05-08T02:45:16.086-07:00

One of the problems for overweight or obese children is the problem of facing up to being fat. It sounds obvious and you would think that parents would be the first to realise that their children need to rein in their weight.That's not what researchers at Newcastle University have found and their findings go right to the heart of the obesity problem.According to experts, accepting that your child

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-53129414638158020352009-04-29T02:44:00.000-07:002009-04-29T12:58:47.633-07:00

Nutrionists have known for a long time that they're not grrreat. I'm talking about breakfast cereals of course.This week saw the publication of a study which named & shamed somed of Britain's most popular breakfast cereals.The consumer group Which? survey has been done before and guess what? Since the previous time, not much as moved on at all.Most of the cereals they surveyed were popular with

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-88491536374457140352009-03-20T12:14:00.000-07:002009-03-23T03:45:36.903-07:00

Question: what have Ian Wright, Chris Hoy, Kelly Holmes and David Beckham got in common? (apart from being famous sports people). Answer: they have all advertised sugary cereals & drinks. This week the Food Magazine is taking them to task for appearing to support some of the worst offenders in the child obesity stakes.Gary Lineker and those crisps have been under fire before, but Gary has

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-49767095769658655882009-03-17T06:12:00.000-07:002009-03-17T06:22:43.786-07:00

Miracle cure stories are always interesting and this week brought one from scientists in California who have made a potential breakthrough. The word "potential" is important in this story and in most of these 'miracle cure' stories.I understand why newspapers have to say things in this way. "There might possibly be a cure for overweight people" is not much of a headline. But there are two dangers

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-20990286999412845722009-03-12T03:33:00.000-07:002009-03-16T09:32:23.160-07:00

Yesterday David Walker was a Lanarkshire GP concerned about the obesity problem-today he is the spoilsport who wants a tax on chocolate. Before you can say "nanny state", Dr Walker, who is actually an expert in nutrition, is being taken to task over his views.For sure, the food and drink industry is not very thrilled about this proposal. A tax on chocolate would leave the way open to taxing

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-69739623853129304072009-03-11T07:51:00.000-07:002009-03-11T09:13:03.003-07:00

Raz, Tom, Charlie, Rocco, General Junk, Miss Demeanour and Master Diaster don't sound like the answer to the nation's obesity crisis. But they might be if scientists at the University of Bangor in Wales are right.These seven cartoon characters are the Food Dudes and they are responsible for changing children's attitudes towards fresh fruit and vegetables. According to parents and teachers who

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-63331493798657988332009-03-09T09:41:00.000-07:002009-03-09T11:42:04.069-07:00

Nuts get a bad press, banned from school lunch boxes, treated with suspicion, shunned and avoided by parents. By far the worst nut on the tree is the humble peanut which isn't even a nut - apparenly it's a legume. Not that this has done much to dent its bad reputation.Around 1 in 50 people in Britain are supposed to suffer from nut allergy. Schools are declared 'nut free zones' and the tasty,

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-9178499517005238042009-02-26T06:34:00.000-08:002009-02-26T06:40:41.370-08:00

I have been accusing health experts and NHS of not really doing much to stem the tide of obesity, but it seems that this is not right.More news on the biggest health threat to society came out yesterday when it was revealed that rates of surgery had rocketed.It seeems that things like gastric banding and stomach stapling have been on the rise and the NHS is keeping busy trying to sort out the

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-71376432607972049352009-02-25T02:47:00.000-08:002009-02-25T02:50:37.772-08:00

Good news about smoking is like finding an invisible needle in a haystack. But a story from Sweden suggests that if it's a toss up between being overweight and smoking, the smoker might be better off.It's a really sad day for obesity when it's getting so bad that it's racing ahead of smoking in the bad health stakes.

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-40509855475558161432009-02-24T09:13:00.001-08:002009-02-24T09:25:32.326-08:00

The predictions of an explosion in obesity and weight-related diseases are coming home to roost alarmingly fast. And inspite of the fact that every day now brings with it some new slant on obesity, today's news on diabetes was high on most news agendas.The warnigns and predictions have been going on for the best part of a decade and by now seem to trip off the tongue, obesity leads to heart

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-68345112643063973342009-02-05T05:48:00.000-08:002009-02-05T06:11:41.363-08:00

The Government is going to take action. Chocolate bars will be shrunk along with bumper sized packets of crisps and other must-have snacks that you can buy on the hoof from petrol stations, vending machines and local shops.Health Minister Alan Johnson has spoken. What he said roughly translated, was that when people buy a huge Mars bar, they scoff the lot. This is due to the pressure of 'waste

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-40596654174948735892009-02-04T06:29:00.000-08:002009-02-05T03:31:20.581-08:00

Obesity causes cancer, especially in the young, according to experts on child health, featured today in various media outlets and the BBC. The experts are saying that by 2012, 1 million children in England will be obese-more will be overweight and that means over 1 million will be at risk from cancer.As we all know, the war against smoking has been won and health officials are now seeing the

Judynoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-18571344765751851322009-02-02T04:46:00.000-08:002009-02-04T04:15:09.463-08:00

I had always thought of Gok Wan as being a proto-type Channel 4 TV presenter, who'd arrived on our screens from some kind of top-secret factory churning out edgy and attractive individuals from spare parts. Not that I'd paid him much attention before, sure he's personable and disarming enough, but I always thought he'd fade from view after the novelty of getting women to strip off and be damned

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-65660709984986731512009-01-05T09:48:00.000-08:002009-01-05T10:11:25.987-08:00

The run up to Christmas seems to have been a really grim time for news on obesity. There was a very interesting study in a journal called Nature Genetics came out a week or so before Christmas which identified the genetic culprits in the obesity stakes.According to a report in the Guardian some people have what are called 'missing letters' in their DNA and can't help themselves. The Scientists

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-59705683629710076702008-12-18T06:20:00.000-08:002008-12-18T12:15:53.796-08:00

The week before Christmas, before the selection boxes, chocolate santas, tubes, tubs and packets of sweets are even wrapped, is probably not a good time to remind parents that child obesity doesn't take time off over the festive period.Maybe this was on the mind of the Scottish Government when it casually mentioned, oh by the way, that about a quarter of all children in the first year of primary

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-68004230644414482422008-12-11T05:21:00.000-08:002008-12-18T12:08:41.716-08:00

Another day, another dollop - of bad news about children's weight that is. The BBC carried a story today from experts that by the time London hosts the Olympic Games, 33 per cent of children will be obese - not just overweight but obese. This story wasn't high on the news agenda although there's not that much news at the moment but it seems that interest in the scary predictions of a rapidly

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-38111723605070614132008-12-05T11:02:00.000-08:002008-12-05T11:11:46.346-08:00

This week the Food Commission is calling for restaurants and fast food takeaways in particular to display clearer information about nutrition-in particular the calorie counts of items on the menu. It happens in the US where all the major fast food outlets show the information close to the counter and tills.It's suggested that this helps people make healthier choices when choosing their food. A

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-74948070332627339612008-11-24T05:26:00.000-08:002008-11-24T05:45:33.043-08:00

Our takeaway, want it now, ready meals, fast food culture has been identified as one of the culpits in the rise of obesity and the last couple of decades has seen a rise in pizza/burger/kebab/chicken takeaways which judging by the take-over of local high streets, must turn an (un)healthy profit.Then a couple of weeks ago, I heard about a fast food salad bar which was on the up selling salads,

Judynoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-63614056942827524352008-11-21T02:37:00.000-08:002008-11-21T03:04:08.599-08:00

Apparently there can be quite a lot - every so often a survey comes along showing how various aspects of life are much worse for people who are overweight. It might be that they don't fare so well in education, or earn less money, or suffer from a range of health problems.In the news this week was a study which was probably the most damning and depressing for overweight women.American researchers

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-76602166734108456612008-11-11T07:07:00.000-08:002008-11-17T04:10:22.535-08:00

This week I was waiting to see what the Government would unveil next in its war on obesity in England. There had been lots of suggestions and a few advance snippets-such as the 'Healthy Towns' pilot schemes to test out ways to make people eat better and be more active.I read all about the swipe cards people in Manchester could use to gain points for buying healthy food and getting involved in

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-73531298470081454192008-11-11T06:46:00.000-08:002008-11-11T07:06:41.953-08:00

A lot of people have strong opinions about Jamie Oliver as well as other "celebrity" chefs although I've never understood why people get so worked up about them. The recent Jamie's Minstry of Food programmes based in Rotherham were (at least on TV)real good food for thought. Apart from the fact that his recipes always seem to magically work out, I love Jamie Oliver for his enthusiastic and

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-17199399724859579922008-11-03T12:59:00.000-08:002008-11-09T07:38:57.337-08:00

Gastric banding or bariatric surgery as it is sometimes more scariliy known, has been talked about for a while, highlighted by the likes of Fern Britten and Anne Diamond who has both very publicy lost dramatic amounts of weight by undergoing the procedure.It was a shock to read that Scotland's respected health and medical guideline group SIGN is looking at allowing this sort of surgery for older

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-41778878172594236952008-10-13T02:25:00.000-07:002008-11-09T07:40:28.916-08:00

I'm still struggling to get to grips with something I've heard that happens at our local high school on a regular basis. It could be an age thing but at my school, you had to be over 16, have written permission from your parents, a papal decree or equivalent to be able to go out at lunchtime. Even then, it was expressly forbidden to eat anything outside school. So strict was this rule that to

Judynoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5230468016163418859.post-25134845467903452132008-10-10T10:23:00.000-07:002008-11-09T07:47:47.982-08:00

Why aren't parents alarmed by the latest figures on child obesity? One in five boys and over one in ten girls aged 2–15 are now obese. Worse still is the prediction that by 2020 half of all children in the UK will be clinically obese, lots more will be overweight and the NHS will be struggling under the unbearable strain.Surely the threat to your children of certain, early and probably painful

Judynoreply@blogger.com0