“it just takes more effort”
“Exercise is also free and makes a big difference too.”
Which both take time and energy - something the poorer families will struggle to find.
We work crazy long hours in the Uk AND have ridiculous commute times considering how small we are - mainly down to poor transport systems throughout the country!
To REALLY tackle obesity we need a govt who really understands and acknowledges that people need enough time at home TO exercise, cook from scratch, shop etc
There's a certain "start up cost" to cooking from scratch. It's easy to have a store cupboard of dried herbs and spices, even things like oil, salt, garlic when you aren't living pound to pound also true
What these plans also don’t take into consideration are the emotional reasons people eat more than necessary and choose less healthy foods. Mh provision in this country is woefully underfunded and poorly delivered, over eating is STILL not seen as an eating disorder when at least some of the time it definitely is.
I was exhausted and the pounds went on! stress can slow metabolism too, it increases cortisol production which affects insulin metabolism and leads to weight gain.
All aspects of why people overeat/eat unhealthily need to be addressed:
1 cost - not just of the main ingredients, but the things that make a dish tasty and appetising. Also energy and water to cook - and wash up - too. I’m in Scotland where water thankfully hasn’t been privatised but I used to live in England and I hear from friends there the shocking amount of water bills. Transport to supermarkets and cheap retailers also needs looked at, food deserts need to be addressed.
2 Time - we have a horrific work/life balance in this country between ridiculously long hours, presenteeism, poor transport meaning commutes are far longer than necessary and as cv has actually shown employers stuck in the dark ages who don’t like employees working from home when it’s perfectly feasible. Give people more time...and energy to shop and cook and they’ll likely cook and eat healthier foods.
3 education - for a variety of reasons there’s at least 1 generation to my knowledge/experience who’s parents were working long hours and didn’t have the time to teach them to cook AND who didn’t get decent cookery classes at school. Cookery classes are still infrequent and poorly delivered. Bring back proper “old school” cookery classes teaching kids to make things like shepherds pie, casseroles etc good basic, healthy, cheap dishes and I feel certain this would help a great deal.
4 advertising - after 9pm is ridiculous! Will work perfectly in advertisers favour as it will likely motivate people late in the day to order take out or have something “junky” to eat. But I understand why during the day isn’t good either - simple - ban it altogether! Foods that are too high in fat, sugar or additives unless something like cheese which has major health benefits.
how many of us watch regular tv? you have a point there, I rarely watch regular tv now it’s mostly streaming. The only advertising I am exposed to is on the radio.
5 Exercise - while you can’t outrun a bad diet it does help, and is a good thing to do anyway if you can. Yes you can exercise at home or go out running/walking, but people do tend to put more effort in and be guided to exercise properly if they go to classes or a gym. Childcare as a pp said is definitely an issue for many, time again is a factor too, and cost. Here in Scotland until recently schoolchildren and pensioners could in many council areas swim for free and I’m told by hcps I know this did make a difference. Now that funding is being repeatedly cut councils are finding they can’t afford to keep doing this and again I’m being told this is being noticed.
Also walking/running for exercise isn’t really free unless you’re willing to risk long term damage to joints from poor trainers. You need the right footwear at the very least especially as many pavements are in a shocking state! Then for women and girls there are the personal safety aspects, it’s fine in the summer going for a run after work while it’s still light quite a different prospect in winter when it may well be pitch dark before you even get home - and again lighting and other safety factors are not being maintained well at the moment.
6 Food environment - supermarkets and other retailers don’t make a lot of profit on veg, fruit, raw protein so they spend a LOT of money on experts who spend a LOT of time and effort in getting shoppers to buy the products that they do make a good profit on - mainly unhealthy snacks!
@seeline you’re right! Half an aisle of greengrocery and 2 aisles each of crisps & biscuits in my local supermarket! I don’t believe that’s purely due to demand!
Chicken shops around schools in London are heaving at lunchtime
I do think allowing children off campus at lunchtimes was a big mistake! When I was at school you weren’t allowed unless your you had written permission from parents as a kid who went home for lunch, the rest either had packed lunches or ate in the dinner hall - and the dinners were not “chips with everything” which started when thatcher cut funding of school lunch provision. We should go back to having dinner ladies who can actually cook and children having more home cooked style dinners as in the past. I remember having dinners like this and for the most part they were perfectly good meals.
Is it not as simple as calories in - calories out, do "junk" calories count double or something?
There’s certainly at least one theory about this.
Apparently we mostly all eat the same VOLUME of food throughout the day, but those who are overweight and eat less healthily are eating more calorie dense foods - 100 cals worth of lettuce is a fair amount of lettuce, 100 cals worth of biscuit is tiny!
I did ww a few years back and lost a couple stones. This was one of the things they discussed that if you simply cut down what you’re eating you’ll get hungry and be more likely to cave to cravings, you need to replace the unhealthier foods with a healthier alternative by volume. Eg instead of just cutting your portion size in half and facing a half empty plate, you replace what you’re “losing” with vegetables or even low fat protein to fill you up.
I ate more by volume on ww than I ever have in my life! But it was veg, fruit, grains, healthy protein rather than chips and chocolate!
So the nutritional make-up of food is every bit as important as it's calorie content.
Absolutely!
I’m also very anti the demonising of certain food groups, we need them ALL for our bodies to function correctly, certain nutrients need other factors eg healthy fat in order for us to absorb them as well as possible.
It's always baffled me that it's cheaper to buy a Mars bar than a banana or an apple!
This is simply not true though. A mars bar is what 60/70p? An apple or banana is around 15-20p
7 Better screening & treatment for conditions that can cause increased appetite/weight gain - perhaps controversial but seeing as so many berate the overweight for “costing the nhs money” I think it’s only fair to include the FACT that there are many people, especially women, who have to fight for years even decades to get certain conditions which are KNOWN to cause weight gain dx and treated! I’ve several friends/family who’ve experienced this who were suffering from conditions from pcos to undx heart failure and who until they were dx were getting repeatedly “told off” by hcps but once they had a dx and were receiving the appropriate treatment the weight fell off! Thyroid conditions in particular seem woefully under dx and treated in this country.