Big Fat Lies

by Hannah Sutter

published by Infinite Ideas Limited 2010

ISBN: 978-1-906821-37-1

I have always maintained that a lot of what passes for scientific research in the topic of our diet is questionable at best, and often downright misleading.

Over time, scientists come to wildly differing conclusions about the food we eat, and the harm it might be doing. We read the latest research, take the latest advice on board, then queasily note that the people who did the research were funded by major corporations whose products – who would have thought it? – are now, suddenly, considered ‘safe’.

Then the government sticks its oar in, and, nanny-like, tells us all what we should be eating and doing every day to keep in shape.

(You can always tell when there are too many politicians. They pop up everywhere, determined to have their say in matters that a reasonable man might have considered were none of their damned business.)

Which might not be a bad thing but for this: they have got it all very badly wrong.

The government has been pushing low fat, high carb diets for a long time now. We’re chided daily, by TV and newspaper ads, to make sure we eat our ‘five a day’ and lay off the fat, get off the couch once in a while and play football with the kids.

The result? An epidemic of obesity. Diabetes case numbers rising astronomically.

‘From 1997 to 2003 there was a 74% rise in new cases of diabetes. And by 2005, more than 4% of the population was classed as having diabetes – nearly double the rate of 10 years earlier. The bulk of cases are type 2 diabetes -which is linked to being overweight or obese – the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health reports. ‘

BBC news report

If you read no other book on diet, read this one. It might just save your life.

Written by Hannah Sutter – who, being a lawyer by training, is free from the taint of any association with the diet industry – it takes a refreshingly beady eyed look at the government’s claims and failings on the subject of our diet. It calls into question every tenet of the current orthodoxy, and points out the lack of scientific proof behind them. It was, and continues to be, unnerving to me to discover just how much of the knowledge about food I’d casually absorbed over the years turns out to be nonsense. I’ve accidentally arrived at a personal diet and a workout regime that serves me well and keeps me healthy, but neither are ones the government would recommend.

Read this book. I don’t often endorse anything so wholeheartedly as this, but it’s worth it. If you’re overweight or obese, read this book. If you have diabetes, read this book. Then get very, very angry indeed. And write to your MP.

The book’s website is worth a look, too – point your browser here.

Filed under: Healthy Eating by admin