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And if you named all the people who would be dead without them..... well it wouldn't be an issue, as our population would be greatly reduced, so I'm sure you wouldn't have time for that nonsense.
Yes, obesity and smoking are a HUGE problem. My mom (a nurse) will scream it to the mountain tops. She often has to call security to help her move an obese patient. She's not going to throw her back out for someone. That would mean she would have to miss work and sick-leave doesn't cover the bills. You have people who can't even wipe their own butt! According to her, obesity, smoking, and motorcycles are the most common reasons why someone is in her care.
I remember a story about a car accident that happened during rush hour. They sent the helicopter to airlift the victim to the hospital (quicker than trying to go through traffic). The helicopter can't take people over 250 lbs. (keep in mind of the EMTs and equipment that are already on it). The victim had to go via ambulance because he or she was too fat.
Instead of giving pay raises to hospital workers, hospitals have to buy bigger MRI machines, X-ray machines, gurneys, and wheelchairs. If the hospital doesn't have the larger machines, they have to send people to the zoo. People die in surgery because of obesity-induced sleep apnea. They stop breathing and they can't intubate, so they have to cut a whole in their neck so that they can put the tube down their airway.
The government doesn't give a rat's ass about us. If they did, then they wouldn't allow companies to make fake food with all these preservatives.
In answer to your question -- yes, absolutely, IMHO.
I've a guilty pleasure: while at the grocery store, I peek into peoples' grocery carts. Especially when they're ahead of me in the check-out line.
99% of the time, the carts piled with snack foods, sodas, ice cream, donuts, white bread, bakery cakes, boxes of processed foods, and packages of fatty hamburger meat, hot dogs, etc. are being pushed by overweight people who do not look in the pink of health. Some are even using motorized carts.
Conversely, the carts piloted by fit/slender-looking folks seem to be filled with lots of veggies/fruits and whole grain kinds of foods...minimally processed.
Try it yourself..it's eye-opening.
Try it yourself, this grocery cart peeking--it's eye-opening.
I agree that education / information is very important, but I also think a FEW things have changed in recent times (last few decades) and may add (negatively) to the overall nutrition issues:
Iodine - used to be in every slice of bread, until the 1980’s when iodine was replaced as an anti-caking agent, by bromide or bromine (check out what that is!). So we used to get regular iodine, in more than table salt. Yet, bromide also displaces iodine. eeeek!
Grass-fed beef - is higher in omega-3’s than fish - however, we rarely get grass-fed beef anymore, unless you search it out, and pay a lot for it. (similar with eggs and hen-feed)
High Fructose Corn Syrup - (also in the 1980’s) largely replaced sugar, that maybe we can metabolize easier? Or used less of? (but HFCS is cheaper - so it’s in 99% of soda drinks now among many other foods - unless you search out the few that use 'real' sugar instead).
Unfortunately, as a physician back in the 1980s, I was telling people that they should replace butter with margarine because it was cholesterol free, and professional organizations like the American Heart Association were telling us as physicians that we should be promoting this. In reality, there was never any evidence that these margarines, that were high in trans fat, were any better than butter, and as it turned out, they were actually far worse than butter.
GMO - which may be genuinely helpful in some instances, but largely involve pesticide activity (inside the plant!! …that doesn’t magically go away after harvest).
Xeno-estrogens - (excess estrogen increases body fat) foreign estrogens which pass into our environment through pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, plastics, fuels, car exhausts, dry cleaning chemicals, industrial waste, meat from animals which have been fattened with estrogenic drugs, and countless other household and personal products which many of us use every day.
SODIUM - Salt intake physiologically set in humans, new study finds - Salt intake physiologically set in humans, new study finds :: UC Davis News & Information
Don’t toss your saltshaker out just yet. A new study led by scientists affiliated with the University of California, Davis, adds further credence to the notion that concern about the amount of salt you consume may be misplaced.
The study documents in humans what neuroscientists have reported for some time: animals’ sodium (salt) intake is controlled by networks in the brain and not by the salt in one’s food. The findings have important implications for future U.S. nutrition policy directed at sodium intake.
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These, among other similar things, are not taught, even in nutrition studies. Yet, they may have significant 'across-the-board' nutritional impacts.
I find Zelva's post very interesting. And I agree with the observations. One must ask why Baby Boomer women are the first generation who will live shorter lives than their mothers.
Given the advances in medicine, that makes little sense--until you consider how our diets have changed from mostly natural to highly processed foods with many chemical additives and genetic modifications.
I would venture that most of our health care dollars (outside of elder care in last 2 years) are spent on self-induced illnesses brought on by eating habits and other lifestyle choices (smoking, drinking, drugs, no exercise, stressful occupation, etc).
I quoted a 1930s doctor who did a study, and it was instantly jumped on for being a quack.
Nutrition being linked to health is quackry.
Do not say that folks do not hold that opinion. Such would be un-true in this very thread.
I think that nutrition is linked to health, and that is held as quackry by some posters.
I really don't think anyone is saying there is no connection between healthy eating and good health. You are spinning this out of proportion. What I am saying is: studies can be done to try and prove anything and eating healthy isn't going to guarantee we will live to be 90 or 100, nor does eating poorly mean death at a young age. Heredity plays a huge part, maybe the number one part. How many people who are grossly overweight (I don't mean 400 lbs) do you know that are in good health or how many do you know with high BP or diabetes that are thin, eat right, exercise and live a really healthy life. I know of several, many in our church or my social groups. BTW, no one is saying people who hold the view: nutrition plays a roll in good health are quacks.
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