Government tackling obesity missing a key element

[HeeeeyDuggee]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-53546151

Government have announced measures to tackle obesity

AIBU to think that although it’s all well and good banning buy 1 get 1 free and advertising before 21:00 what they really need to do is make fresh fruit and vegetables and good quality meat cheaper for people to buy.

It may be a regional thing but buying enough veg for the week here costs a fortune and it goes off within days. Where as you can buy a massive packet nuggets and chips for much less.

Pre covid it was bad enough for lots of families but given the ramifications on jobs and the economy I think lots more families will struggle to afford decent healthy food.

Ps not a fat persons bashing thread I myself am over weight

Even at £200 pa, that's around 50p per day and you've probably saved bus fare or petrol while you were doing it plus the cost of the crisps and chocolate you might have been eating on the sofa if you didn't go out for a walk

On this we will have to disagree...

1. I don't think you would save money. The average commute is 8.8 miles so the idea that someone who has never exercised before could just replace their bus/car journey with walking is almost certainly unrealistic. Available time, fitness levels and other commitments (such as dropping kids at school on the way) are likely to hamper this. Some people might be able to save £15 a month this way but I would not be surprised to find out many couldn't. Besides, the point was that walking and running are free. My point back was that, in my experience of doing both, they are not. They require a minimum input to keep yourself comfortable and healthy and that those who are already overweight will probably require more than that as their wear and tear on their shoes will be greater, their need to keep the skin on their feet blister-free will be greater. Plus there are quite a few other variations of body that require more than just good shoes and socks. e.g. most women require good breast support for running. Some will require it also for walking. Also, exercise is not the key to weight loss. It's great for many things but losing weight is not one of them.

1. I do not buy the constant myth that someone who isn't exercsing is, by default, sat on a sofa eating chocolate. Nor do I feel comfortable the underhand judgement that goes with such a comment.

I have to ask why you need a car or an uber delivery to get food from the McDonalds that is just across the road from you and that you can see from your kitchen window

Because they only opened the drive through.

Not to mention the safety aspect. If my only time to exercise is late at night, I'm not going to go out running on my own.

I work in public health so know a bit about this. First of all, Google 'the obesogenic map' to understand how complicated the reasons that people are obese actually are. What we need to do is lots of small nudges in various different directions.

There is already a scheme in place card Healthy Start whereby people on benefits with children can get a certain amount of free milk, fruit and vegetables using a voucher system. The uptake is low.

We also know that the people who are experiencing the worst health inequalities are on the whole, poor. They might not be living in an environment where they can cook, they might not know how to cook because they might not have been taught or they might not be great readers, they might be completely strapped for time and lacking in confidence to cook. If you don't have a lot of money and you know your kids will eat chips you will give them chips rather than broccoli because at least you have full children then.
There are also families where just keeping everyone safe and happy takes all of the family resources and a healthy diet is last on the list. The family may live in what we call food deserts where getting to a large superstore isn't possible and they've only for a corner shop to shop at, which actually might have a tiny range of fresh stuff and be very expensive.

There's a million more reasons but these are some of the big ones.

@ZeldalovesLink

Yes! This. How much would a free £20 box per low income household help with a relatively small start up cost?

I actually really like this idea. Like the Scottish baby box, but for food. It could have olive oil, balsamic vinegar, good quality salt, black pepper, and then jars of the most commonly used herbs and spices. Just to get people started, then they could replace things as they ran out and it would be much more manageable than a huge initial outlay.

I find this suggestion a bit bizarre. Without coming across as stereotypical the people that can and do cook will use olive oil, garlic, dried herbs (e.g. italian seasoning, chilli powder, curry spices etc) which is what would make up a,starter pack..the demographic this is aimed at will probably not have the skills to create a healthy tasty dish and it becomes a money wasted initiative. I read a similar thread about teaching basic cooking skills a few days ago and I think once the course ended the skills learned were not carried through in day to day meal planning.
I dont know the answer because you are now on the 2nd generation of families that are obese giving the same excuses of fresh food is too expensive , lack of skills to prepare wholesome food and saying they dont have the time. From a personal point of view I am overweight because although I have a fairly healthy diet, my portion size is too large and I don't do enough physical exercise. I truly believe most obese individuals are obese because they need to wat less and move more!

@Thisisworsethananticpated

Poverty is a cause of obesity

Not always , so yes in many cases it undeniably is

But travel to an airport , a motorway service station . All you can see is stalls selling unhealthy food and erm , overweight people

So it’s the UK culture
We don’t cook , we eat processed food and we drink a shit load too

I honestly can never understand why people say poverty causes obesity. I've gone through a few financial crises (of the having to use food bank type) and the weight always falls off me. A combination of not being able to afford enough food, and not being able to afford bus fares so having to walk miles every day. To be quite honest, the easiest way for me to lose weight is to return to the kind of diet I eat when I'm skint, which is just things like lentil stew, beans on toast, rice and frozen vegetables with a fried egg, just really simple food with no extra money for snacks. I grew up in a poor family and it was always toast or cereal for breakfast, a sandwich or cheese/egg on toast for lunch and potatoes, some seasonal veg and a small amount of meat for dinner. And that was it for the day. Everyone was thin and pretty healthy.

Just making food even more expensive! I mean I will probably lose weight simply because it will cost more to feed my kids, they always come first, so I will just be skipping meals.

I have little faith in what the government has planned to solve the obesity crisis.

I’ve posted this before. I was a fat kid who grew up in a morbidly obese family. We were poor so food choices were limited but I can’t blame our weight solely on that - we were lazy. Lazy bodies so didn’t exercise and a lazy mind to even consider eating something other than chips with whatever.

When I was in my early 20s and away from home after uni I decided to do something about my weight. I went from 15 stone to 9 stone in a year due to sheer will power. I taught myself about nutrition and found a love for running.

Education is key. I have a colleague who I work with who is morbidly obese. She always comments that she wishes she could eat what I have for lunch (often leftovers) as it looks tastier than her diet lunch (she’s always on Slimming World). What she fails to see is that her huge tuna pasta with low cal mayo is more calories than my chicken stirfry purely down to portion size and refined sugars and carbs.

People want a quick fix but it’s takes the effort and control initially to retrain your mind and body.

If 2/3 of the population are overweight or obese, it can't all be down to poverty.

The fattest person I know is a professional woman with a degree in biochemistry and a doctorate, so its ot all about education either.

That's what's wrong with all these discussions there's no on argument or answer.

However, whatever situation people find themselves in it does need (imo) to start with personal responsibility and a change in social ideals. No, we dont need plus size models, no it's not OK to be very overweight, yes, a child who is fed to obesity is abused, yes some health conditions are self inflicted. Of course the issues around why it happens are complex but we do need to make it OK to talk about people taking responsibility for their own health, even/especially where that means they need to seek help to do so. Then we need to make sure that help is available.

They might not be living in an environment where they can cook, they might not know how to cook because they might not have been taught or they might not be great readers, they might be completely strapped for time and lacking in confidence to cook.

And great big reason why they don't cook might be that they just don't want to cook. Why is this always missed off the list of reasons? Cooking is always painted as something everyone would want to do if only they had the time/money/skills. When my children leave home I plan to never cook again, just eat out. Maybe a focus of public health could be to make convenience food better for us? Work with people the way they are, not try to change them to how we want them to be.

With regard exercise, I was taking to my husband about our parents exercise habits the other day. We're both early 50s and our parents NEVER exercised, not one single time in our lifetime. Even as children when we went swimming or on holiday, parents never, ever swam. My parents also both smoked all their lives as well. Myself and my husband both do exercise and did Parkrun every weekend. We also eat more vegetables that our parents did, my parents were both overweight, I'm not (and work really hard not to be, if I lived how I want I would be).

Not trying to come across as obnoxious but could it be an issue of cultural conditioning lead by decades of ultra processed convenience food marketing and ease of availability?

Lifestyle and social norms have changed dramatically over past generations. Long gone are traditions for spending time to appreciate and develop the art of gastronomy with satisfaction and enjoyment to cater for oneself and family and instead the modern chore of urban survival refuelling with anything preferably tasty but quick and easy and likely either factory made oven ready or delivered on a plate to your door at the touch of a button? Time is best spent watching brain dead crap on media etc than playing chef in the kitchen exercising brain, creativity and exercise in and out of the kitchen to burn off the calories rather than couch surfing.

There is of course a basic obesity difference between breadline and connoisseur and a diversity in between. Too much of a "good" thing differs somewhat with too much ultra processed chemical infused packaged crap which is not necessarily cheaper than buying essential fresh basics and knocking up a simple meal with online Alexa, Google or Siri tutorial assistance if required. Possibly ideally cordon bleu but in reality Gordon Bennett

Isn't that a little hypocritical of you? If you're overweight too you haven't only been having "skinny whatever".

I think that’s unfair to the poster who mentioned going to a coffee shop and seeing people drinking hot chocolate with whipped cream and eating muffins.

She knew that she was a little overweight and was exercising restraint in order to lose weight. She was pointing out that there is a group of people who must know that they are overweight but go on eating the bad, if delicious, stuff, and that that is the heart of the problem. That’s not hypocritical.

However, whatever situation people find themselves in it does need (imo) to start with personal responsibility and a change in social ideals. No, we dont need plus size models, no it's not OK to be very overweight, yes, a child who is fed to obesity is abused, yes some health conditions are self inflicted. Of course the issues around why it happens are complex but we do need to make it OK to talk about people taking responsibility for their own health, even/especially where that means they need to seek help to do so. Then we need to make sure that help is available

This. It's a very unpopular opinion, but I think we don't need to "celebrate" the morbidly obese in some kind of fat acceptance movement. It's as damaging as using anorexic models, IMO. That's not to say that people should body shame heavier people. They absolutely should not, but morbid obesity shouldn't be held up as an ideal either.

With regard exercise, I was taking to my husband about our parents exercise habits the other day. We're both early 50s and our parents NEVER exercised, not one single time in our lifetime. Even as children when we went swimming or on holiday, parents never, ever swam. My parents also both smoked all their lives as well. Myself and my husband both do exercise and did Parkrun every weekend. We also eat more vegetables that our parents did, my parents were both overweight, I'm not (and work really hard not to be, if I lived how I want I would be)

I think previous generations didn't exercise like we do now, with gyms and runs etc. But in general they lived much more active lives. Not one of my grandparents had a car, they walked everywhere or got a bus or train. They would have to go to the shops daily to get food, no supermarkets in the 1950s. They walked the children to school. They couldn't really eat anything extra than what was planned for that day. The children played in the street because there was no TV.
It was just a different time, a different form of exercise.

@DopamineHits, no not hypocritical as I am attempting to remedy past bad eating habits by reducing my calorie intake rather than continuing to indulge myself while waiting for the government to do something for me.

Thanks for clarifying about McDonald's.

For the people complaining that meat has risen in price: what short memories we have. It was only seven years ago that people were up in arms over horse meat getting into Iceland lasagnes. It happened because meat was being sourced from the cheapest suppliers.

Meat is more expensive because it is being sourced more carefully and because producers are required to be stricter on animal welfare.

You’re not going to get a £1 lasagne without corners being cut.

Meat should be a fuck load more expensive and very much less available because it's terrible for the environment and not great for your health

Don't forget because the animals suffer horribly to produce cheap meat!

but I think we don't need to "celebrate" the morbidly obese in some kind of fat acceptance movement.
I agree.

@KenDodd

but I think we don't need to "celebrate" the morbidly obese in some kind of fat acceptance movement. I agree.

Yes, this is another aspect that has to be addressed.

As I posted above I was obese but have MORE comments made about my weight as a slim person. I’m 5 ft 7 and hover around 9 stone but I also run a lot so ‘look’ slimmer due to body shape.

I would never ‘fat shame’ and actually I try to avoid conversations about weight, but we need to address perceptions that slim = anorexic. My children are also slim but I’m told constantly that’s is unhealthy that their ribs and shoulder blades can be seen and they ‘need more meat on their bones’.

I think ‘poverty’ is a red herring. There are very few people in this country who are so poor they can’t afford the electricity to cook a stew or have no gas to cook porridge or make a soup on the hob, and a lot of that is down to poor choices and a chaotic lifestyle.

Also in our technological age, there are very few people who don’t have access to the internet and a screen to do a 30 min workout video.

Let’s face it’s down to laziness. Easier to bung a ready meal in the oven or order a takeaway, rather than find some nice recipes online, do a meal plan and make them. Sit for hours looking at your phone rather than get off your backside and follow an online fitness video.

Most of the people I know who are obese are not living in poverty. In fact when I lived on a council estate, very few of my neighbours were overweight.

It’s all just too much effort to get fit and think about what they’re eating.

I say that as a former morbidly obese person!

The government are correct to tackle this but it should be with an emphasis on people taking responsibility for themselves, certainly not being paid for every pound they lose. The reward is feeling much better and increasing your chances of living longer!

I bought 3 chickens from a "proper" butchers last week. £10 for all three. I'll admit I bought them but it's bothered me ever since. How can that be right for the birds, the producer, the transport infrastructure or the butcher?

Not trying to come across as obnoxious but could it be an issue of cultural conditioning lead by decades of ultra processed convenience food marketing and ease of availability?

I totally agree.

"Most of the people I know who are obese are not living in poverty."

Look at the stats though. Much more obesity among low income people than other income groups. The stats tell us more than just your social circle.

"Not trying to come across as obnoxious but could it be an issue of cultural conditioning lead by decades of ultra processed convenience food marketing and ease of availability?"

Yes, if you think about the Rotherham mothers stuffing turkey twizzlers through the school fence after Jamie Oliver made the children have healthy meals.

CoronaIsShit bollocks would be too kind a word to use for your ideas. If you are obsess I'm guessing you have tried to change this, at some point? Then you will have some understanding of the sheer effort that goes into dieting, calorie counting, avoiding certain foods, avoiding places that sell certain foods, planning what to have on a night out, planning exercise regimes, recording everything in and out on your Fitbit or whatever. A much, much easier time would be had if most overweight people had never gone on that first diet.p