WE ARE WHAT WE EAT

[Tizer]

Thanks!

[Stanley]

Only a minor matter but an indication of why we have to be alert when shopping. I grabbed the veggie offer on the end of aisle gondola but then had a look at the same products, carrots and parsnips on the main shelves, both cheaper per kg than the 'offers'. They are as cute as a barrow-load of monkeys. Like Tiz I read the labels!

[plaques]

We regularly get bombarded with statistics telling us how fat and obese people are and how it can be damaging to their health.
Overweight? Another load ,pardon the pun, is out for East Lancs. which I assume includes Barlick,
Hyndburn has the highest percentage of obese adults in East Lancashire at 31 per cent. That compares with 27.3 per cent in Rossendale, 26.9 per cent in Burnley, 24.2 per cent in Pendle and 21.8 per cent in Ribble Valley.
As the percentages of obesity increase perhaps our perception of what is overweight also increases. " I know I'm overweight but just look at him/her, I'm not that bad after all". Although Pendle sits towards the bottom of the league, Oh dear, here I go again, with nearly 25% obesity the over all outlook is not very good, it just gets worse doesn't it? Perhaps we should be thinking of changing the approach to this problem with more individual targeting rather than bulk statistics. I'm going to quit at this point.

[Big Kev]

The problem is that it's all based on Body Mass Index (BMI) and it's not very reliable. Obese usually relates to fat, there are a lot of very fit sports people, with a very low fat content, who come into the obese category because of muscle...

[plaques]

Kev I would tend to agree with you if we were just talking about being classed as overweight but I think obese is a different matter.
Taking myself as an example 6 ft and 12 stone is mid range healthy weight, 13 stone would see me enter overweight and 16 stone obese and then upwards. Admittedly there are some who could be 16 stone of muscle but not many. I personally don't care about anybody else's weight unless they step on my toe. NHS BMI index.

[Big Kev]

I'm 6ft 7in and weigh in at 19st, to meet my ideal BMI I should be 14st...

[PanBiker]

I'm around 5ft 8" and should be 10 - 12 stone. I was 12 until last year when I was pumped full of steroids to stop my head exploding! Can't have everything, I'm 13 now and have to start again to get back down. My walking and cycling regime is not back to full strength yet and may never be, bike has yet to be trialled since my op.

[Wendyf]

Waist to height ratio is a reasonably good guide to obesity. If your waist is over half the measurement of your height you are likely to suffer from health issues. Some folk consider their waists to be underneath their belly but it's right round that plumpest part!
Fat around the middle is the most dangerous, fat on thighs and hips is a different type and not necessarily unhealthy.

[Big Kev]

I'm OK then, my waist is a fair way under half my height

[Wendyf]

I'm OK then, my waist is a fair way under half my height

[Stanley]

What happens if you have short legs?

[Wendyf]

Then you can use the waist to hip ratio! if it's greater than 1.0 you are in trouble.

[Stanley]

I'll not bother Wendy. All these estimates say I am obese.....

[Wendyf]

If you don't eat that burger today you can save over 2000 litres of water! What utter rubbish.

https://www.waterwise.org.uk/meat-free-monday/

[Tizer]

I wrote this back in 2014 and I'd written earlier than that on OG about the failings of BMI. I thought by now we'd be using a better method for assessing an individual's fat status, but not so. Methods are available but they haven't been taken up.

I've explained in the past about how the Body Mass Index (BMI) is a bad way to judge whether someone is normal weight, overweight or obese. It was designed in the 1800s for a different purpose and should never have been used to assess obesity and we all know that BMI values are often misleading (for example, muscular athletes are judged as obese according to their BMI). At last some progress is being made with a better method. Canadian scientists have developed a better method using near-infra-red spectroscopy to measure the proportion of body fat. It uses a portable instrument with a handheld device that is applied to the skin and detects how much fat is present in the body tissue. This will give a more accurate and meaningful way of determining degree of obesity instead of relying on BMI which is simply based on body weight and height.

[Stanley]

Wendy, such arguments are bandied about by Vegans especially the zealots who advocate complete elimination of the meat trade. They have no idea of what they speak. The same people will be in favour of minimum tillage, what they don't realise is that the natural way to get better soil quality and maximum carbon sequestration is grazing animals on permanent pasture. Best soil quality alone is achieved in mixed farming with good rotations. I have been banging on for years about trace elements and micro-nutrients in well managed soil.
I think it was Ben Franklin who said that for every problem there was an obvious and totally erroneous solution. I class BMI in that category, it was simple, cheap and fast so go for it!

[Wendyf]

What's shocking is that this has been picked up by Watersmart and some of the major water suppliers as the truth. Also peddling the idea that we can live perfectly well on a basketful of a few cheap vegetables. Now I love my veg and respect anyone who makes a choice not to eat meat, but a "plant based diet" is a very different thing.

[Stanley]

My beef (!) against these zealots is that they do not appear to know much about nutrition or good farming practice. These are the same people that rail against saturated fat and take vitamin pills to make up for possible deficiencies in their intake. (Or is that also a canard?)

[Tizer]

`Has Leeds cracked the obesity problem?' LINK
`...Those involved in the Leeds project point to the work done with pre-school children. The city council developed a child-obesity strategy a decade ago that made this age group a key priority. Staff who work with pre-school children, including children's centres workers and health visitors, were trained to promote healthy eating. And parenting classes encouraged healthy snacking, eating as a family and the importance of cooking nutritious meals from scratch. The council has taken other steps too. There has been a big focus on getting children active through dance, while there has been an active local campaign to encourage families to reduce their sugar intake...'

The important word here is `pre-school'. The earlier you make the intervention the better, it's a critical time. That's the difference, that's why it's working for Leeds.

[Stanley]

I've been watching those reports and agree with you Tiz. I have always said that any meaningful improvements in people's self awareness of the value of good nutrition can only come from Primary Education. At four years old Mrs Ackroyd was making us chant "Peas beans and lentils are flesh forming foods". I've never forgotten it. We were also taught that the cheapest foods were usually the most nutritious, potatoes, peas, herrings and offal were drummed into us, they were cheap then and again I have not forgotten.
I heard an 'expert nutritionist' on R4 yesterday in a discussion about the Leeds initiative say that unfortunately 'healthy food' was the most expensive. I suspect she was thinking about Quinoa and Tofu! Natural ingredients home cooked are still incredibly cheap but she didn't seem to be aware of this. I look at other people's shopping baskets in the Co-op and wonder at their choices.

[plaques]

I look at other people's shopping baskets in the Co-op and wonder at their choices.

Shopping at the local supermarket Mrs P would regularly bump into one of the hospital consultants she used to work with. While exchanging pleasantries he would often pick through her trolley giving a grunt of approval as he went through. Mrs P would be quietly fuming but retaliated by taking an interest in his trolley. He finally died aged 92 so there may have been something in it.

[Whyperion]

I have sort of noticed locally in London that the larger bodies are tending to be African originating women (and girls). I am thinking that much of that must be the poor quality high quantity food that is sold these days.

[Stanley]

Please can I get to 92?

[Tizer]

I have sort of noticed locally in London that the larger bodies are tending to be African originating women (and girls)

They are genetically pre-disposed to obesity, as are people of Pacific descent too. LINK

[Whyperion]

Tizer, maybe that should go over to the science thread. At least one of my Indian Friends had weight issues and diabetes which again I think is a generic trait. One of my other friends had an Indian Father and African (Sudenese I think) Mother, she was as thin as beanpole - but maybe she just ate a better diet.
Since we no longer use up calories or develop muscle in chasing our food to kill it first, or bash the soil up to grow, havest and hand pestle it to consumption it is no wonder we have to do things differently or modify our food intake.