Food industry blamed for surge in obesity

Sarah Boseley, health editor
Friday September 13, 2002
The Guardian

At least three in four of British men and women will be overweight within 10 to 15 years, according to health professionals who accuse governments of failing to tackle the problem because of fear of the food and drink industry.
An extraordinary rise in the numbers of the overweight and obese has taken place in the last 20 years. In 1980 6% of men and 8% of women were overweight. By the mid 1980s, that had doubled. Now 65.5% of men and 55.2% of women are overweight or obese in the UK, and the numbers are climbing.

A European Union summit on obesity in Copenhagen yesterda brought together government ministers and health professionals. They heard that obesity was becoming more of a threat than smoking.

A report from the International Obesity Taskforce said that a ban on tobacco advertising should be followed by restrictions to stop industry targeting children with adverts for junk food and sweets and prevent the installation of vending machines for soft drinks in schools.

"Officials are pretty terrified around the whole of Europe about how to confront some of these huge vested interests," Philip James, chairman of the taskforce, told the summit.

"The fast food and soft drink industries have enormous vested interests which we need to confront. If we don't, the epidemic of childhood obesity is going to rip through Europe so fast - with Britain being in the worst category - that we will have clinics of diabetic children of 13, where the evidence is clear that they will have major problems of blindness by the time they get into their 30s.

"Kidney units should be regearing because they are going to need huge numbers of kidney transplants and dialysis."

Neville Rigby, director of public affairs at the taskforce, said there had been "a quantum shift" in what was happening to people's body mass because of the changes in diet and the lifestyle.

Between 1993 and 2000, the numbers of young men aged 16 to 24 classified as obese - with a body mass index of more than 30 - jumped from 4.9% to 9.3%. The rise in the 25 to 34 age group in the same seven years was from 10% to 20.3%. "These should be the fit young men who are the pride of the nation," he said.

Among 16- to 24-year-old women the rise was 11.1% to 15.7%. Even more alarming, he said, was a new category of super-obese women, with a body mass index of 40 or more. These women - so large they cannot tie their shoelaces or occupy a single seat on a bus - were 1% of the age group in 1993. By 2000 they were 2.4%.

Men and women who carry excess weight risk heart disease, cancers and diabetes. Type two diabetes, usually caused by obesity, used to be unknown in childhood but now paediatricians are having to learn how to treat it.

The couch potato lifestyle had made weight problems worse, but the chief reason for the epidemic was diet, said the taskforce report, which criticises the industry for targeting children.

"Large business interests are involved in both promoting sedentary behaviour and the passive over-consumption of food," it said. "The food and drink industry seeks to focus on inactivity and promote sports to divert attention from the role of food and drinks. Analysis of marketing strategies shows a targeting of the young and particularly of pre-school children to establish brand preferences."

YES! They are finally beginning to blame diet. For so long they have been saying all that is needed is that we get out and exercise. And it even looks like they are blaming the right kinds of foods (i.e. junk foods and sodas).

;-Deb

Amen. I'm sure the food industry would be arguing, "but we're not making everyone eat junk, it's their decision. We're just being aggresive and competative so we can battle each other for market share." That may be true, but if that's the case, then we need an equally strong "lobby" (for the lack of a better word) on behalf of nutrition. How much money do farmers and their marketing boards have to advertise, compared to Nestle, Frito-Lay and Coca-Cola?

IMHO, the food industry *is* to blame for the paradigm shift in attitude. Example: the ever-increasing "value meals" at fast food joints. They're redefined a normal meal. I'm stunned at the number of young people who think that eating junk all the time is *normal*.

I read where they made the comment that of course phsycians that advocate low carb/high fat/ moderate protien diets could be sued because of course they are blaming THEM for the obesity problem.. LOL ( I am still trying to figure that one out!)
Do they have no idea that could cut both ways.. a Pcos woman could SUE an unresponsive dr for ignoring her REAL problem and putting her on this sort of a diet.. thus in the end finishing her off with diabetes?
Or if Dr Schwarzbein is right that many people have heart disease first..then we yank them off fats and onto a high carb low fat diet.. and ERGO... we have DIATBETICS!
I mean.. do they not think this cuts both ways??
They have been pushing a diet that breaks down into so much sugars because they have a personal agenda that also has big business in their back pocket??
Again.. As Dr Atkins I am APPALLED that cocoa puff and other such foods has the endorsement of the AHA. !!!!
Goofy.. truly goofy!
Poofie! ( I didn't try to rhyme!)

Or put you on birth control pills to "regulate" your periods without doing any sorts of tests to find out WHY they're irregular and then tell you that your weight problem is "overactive hand to mouth syndrome". (yes, this actually happened to me and yes, now I'm a diabetic...thanks, doc.)

Our side should be promoting self-responsibility, along with low-carbing. Our "fall" occurred when we looked to someone else--usually government experts and their science and business cronies--to tell us how to eat and live. We have to recover individual self-government, not just in diet but in all things. The lawsuit is no solution. Only the lawyers win that costly game.

Sheldon

Great. The USDA, FDA, and AMA get children eating their 300g per day of carbs, and everybody but the USDA, FDA, and AMA pay the price. (insert British equivalents if you'd like)

As Schlosser said in Fast Food Nation, the food industry guys aren't evil, they're just businessmen. They'll sell you grass-fed beef or tobacco salad if the demand is there.

There is no reason for the food industry (growers, supermarkets, restaurants) to do anything but raise prices in response to the coming lawsuits. What else are they supposed to push? There's no profit in striking off on their own. The gov't says low-fat, minimal protein, high-carb. Doctors say low-fat, minimal protein, high-carb. The media 'experts' parrot all this and consumers do the best they can.

My two best friends, Dr. Phil and Dr. Atkins.....



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