Let’s get one thing straight; gunky drinks, ludicrous fasts, body wraps (Lord preserve us) and shoving tubes into your bottom do NOT detoxify you. That is what our kidneys, liver and skin are there for. Get it? Apparently not.
I don’t know what the trading standards people are up to either but they seem to find it acceptable that these charlatans and their ludicrous ‘detox’ claims remain unchallenged.
Planning to go on the ‘lose ten pounds in a week’ diet? You know, the one that forgets to end the statement by adding that you’ll practically be guaranteed to shove it all back on in no time at all AND some more.
So why oh why do we humans with a (pea) brain fall for this utter crap. We know the diet industry is worth billions. Of course it is – fad diets don’t work and if they did there wouldn’t BE a billion pound diet industry.
The most, shall we say, Rubenesque of my friends who have a ‘diet book’ library the size of Foyles and who know how many calories in a pea are testament to the fact that failure is assured when trying to continually deprive themselves in an almost Dickensian fashion.
Of course we also know that the subject of weight gain is full of emotional issues. Many people use food to comfort themselves – it’s rarely about hunger.
Lord professor Darzi, an eminent surgeon and former United Kingdom global ambassador for health and life sciences, wants a ban on take-aways that are less than four hundred metres from schools and also wishes to introduce an Ofsted style rating for how well schools promote healthy eating.
These are good ideas, but if you don’t come from a home promoting at least five a day and a diet which largely excludes processed sugar (the hidden enemy) and salt, I can’t see them having much effect.
He’s also is a firm believer that thousands of obese people should undergo surgery – a band, a gastric sleeve or in severe cases, a gastric bypass. I’m with him on this. It will save the NHS millions in the long run.
There is an uphill struggle ahead of us and the NHS is groaning under the weight of treating obesity and diabetes, never mind heart and liver disease. I teach a healthy eating course and am constantly amazed at the level of ignorance I come across. I also firmly believe that small but significant changes are easy to introduce and can make a huge difference to overall health.
If I had a magic wand I would make sure that people ate together in a leisurely fashion like our Mediterranean friends with an array of meat, fish, olive oil, fruit and veg. If you were spotted eating on the hoof in Italy they’d take you to a psychiatrist. It’s that simple. Know what you’re putting in your belly, walk briskly every day if you don’t belong to a gym, enjoy your treats without a shred of guilt, eat and talk together. If only……
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