The prestigious Institute of Medicine and several federal agencies are teaming up to produce an HBO documentary on obesity called "The Weight of the Nation." No doubt it will be well done, but you can predict that it will have lots of shots of unidentified fat butts and academic talking heads portentously announcing that, for the first time in US history, many of our children and grand children will live shorter lives than previous generations due to poor food and sedentary lifestyles.
Frank Bruni wrote an insightful piece about the documentary and obesity in the NY Times. The most important line in his article is the one with the words, "...we need to rethink and remake our environment much more thoroughly than we seem poised to do." I think what he really means is that we need to make more fundamental and rapid changes than our policymakers and institutions are ready to make because they are slow to react and pretty much under the control of agribusiness. That or they are as ignorant as many of the rest of us.
Recently I was at a conference on workplace wellness in Colorado. Knowing I'd have to battle traffic going into the conference center in downtown Denver, I skipped breakfast because they were going to serve breakfast before the opening session. I figured at a wellness conference I could count on finding some good protein sources, like eggs and sausage, because a solid breakfast goes a long way towards stabilizing blood sugars for the rest of the day.
What a surprise to find the offerings consisted of deadly choices like high carb granola and bagels, i.e., sugar once out of the gut and into the bloodstream and low fat yogurt with 26 grams of sugar! I remembered that when I read Bruni's article. I also remembered that the keynote speaker was a PhD Director from a recently constructed obesity research center that would house some of the top scientists studying the problem. He said something very odd: that we should all be patient with the fast food industry because they are trying to come up with healthy alternatives. Really?
The exact opposite is true. Yep, the obesity epidemic has many causes - sedentary lives in front of computers, kids ride rather than walk to school, the stress of long commutes, etc. - but a MAJOR cause is fast food that's laden with sugars, chemicals, and carbs. This food is carefully engineered by PhD's like the pudgy CEO to fire the dopamine receptors so people crave the food just like addicts crave cocaine.
Many of the MDs and PhDs who are experts in the obesity field are as in the grip of Big Food as a mouse being slowly killed by boa constrictor. They end up being apologists for corporations that they should condemn.
What Bruni intimates (correctly) is that there needs to be a massive shift in our social norms. A good place to start would shun industrial fast food just as we do tobacco. Industrial food should be exiled from houses, work cafeterias, and public buildings. This cause will not be lead by many academics or government institutions because their research funding and government largess depends on keeping these powerful, and often vindictive, political forces placated and fixated on their stock prices.
Don't wait for the big institutions to tell you what you need to do, which the people in them often don't do themselves. You can start to make better food choices right now. More fresh foods, more organic, more grass fed. Tell your family, friends, and co-workers why these foods are better and invite them to try it. Your example will inspire more people than any documentary with a bunch of talking heads.
Showing posts with label Institute of Medicine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Institute of Medicine. Show all posts
Brain Candy
Stimulating stuff :
Exercise and Stem Cells
Doing research on rats, the University of Tel Aviv made another small step for mankind towards understanding the miracle of exercise. In this case, they found that endurance exercise (likely it would be true of resistance exercise as well, but guess it's hard to get rats to lift weights) increases muscle stem cells, which might be key to preventing or slowing sarcopenia, the wasting of muscles that occurs with aging. What's interesting is the researcher dreams of finding a pill people can pop. How about just exercising more?
More Is Better
Speaking of pill popping, the credible Institute of Medicine has released the results of their research on Vitamin D. In the past few years, an alphabet of vitamins has been touted to do all kinds of wonderful things for us; first it was C, then E, and lately Vitamin D. While all these vitamins do play important roles in our health, somehow when we hear something is good, we think more must be even better. Often the "more" message is supported by the supplement industry. Read what the IOM has to say. Contrary to rumors, most North Americans get enough Vitamin D, so crucial to bone health. Remember Vitamin D shortage is what causes rickets, a disease with skeletal deformities. The IOM confirms Vitamin D is important to bone health, but other claims about cancer prevention and heart health are questionable. There's a nice chart with recommended levels by age.
Getting Vitamins the Good Old-Fashioned Way
Dr. Mercola has a concise collection of info on vegetables, which is the preferred way to get our nutrients (see the Becoming a Lean, Mean, Eating Machine last month). Especially useful is a chart showing which vegetables are worth the premium to go organic. Mercola sells supplements, but to his credit, his article concludes that the best way to get your nutrients is by eating vegetables.
Why Wii Fit?
Gretchen Reynolds has an excellent article in the NY Times about exercising via video games like Wii Fit. No surprise, studies find the games are not physically demanding enough to for most folks to get the health benefits of real exercise. However, they did find that the technology worked well to improve the balance of older folks in their 70's. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the exercises might not help TOJ's of all ages, too. Balance is completely overlooked in many exercise routines.
Exercise and Stem Cells
Doing research on rats, the University of Tel Aviv made another small step for mankind towards understanding the miracle of exercise. In this case, they found that endurance exercise (likely it would be true of resistance exercise as well, but guess it's hard to get rats to lift weights) increases muscle stem cells, which might be key to preventing or slowing sarcopenia, the wasting of muscles that occurs with aging. What's interesting is the researcher dreams of finding a pill people can pop. How about just exercising more?
More Is Better
Speaking of pill popping, the credible Institute of Medicine has released the results of their research on Vitamin D. In the past few years, an alphabet of vitamins has been touted to do all kinds of wonderful things for us; first it was C, then E, and lately Vitamin D. While all these vitamins do play important roles in our health, somehow when we hear something is good, we think more must be even better. Often the "more" message is supported by the supplement industry. Read what the IOM has to say. Contrary to rumors, most North Americans get enough Vitamin D, so crucial to bone health. Remember Vitamin D shortage is what causes rickets, a disease with skeletal deformities. The IOM confirms Vitamin D is important to bone health, but other claims about cancer prevention and heart health are questionable. There's a nice chart with recommended levels by age.
Getting Vitamins the Good Old-Fashioned Way
Dr. Mercola has a concise collection of info on vegetables, which is the preferred way to get our nutrients (see the Becoming a Lean, Mean, Eating Machine last month). Especially useful is a chart showing which vegetables are worth the premium to go organic. Mercola sells supplements, but to his credit, his article concludes that the best way to get your nutrients is by eating vegetables.
Why Wii Fit?
Gretchen Reynolds has an excellent article in the NY Times about exercising via video games like Wii Fit. No surprise, studies find the games are not physically demanding enough to for most folks to get the health benefits of real exercise. However, they did find that the technology worked well to improve the balance of older folks in their 70's. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the exercises might not help TOJ's of all ages, too. Balance is completely overlooked in many exercise routines.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)