Obesity linked to poverty

I have no real excuse for being a disinterested cook. I had Domestic Science lessons at school.

When I first left school and went to London to work as a nanny for a titled couple, on my FIRST night, she asked me to make a stuff marrow! I was OK with the bolognaise sauce, but a cheese sauce? I had to phone around my friends from home and get someone to relay to me how to do it over the phone!

Fancy expecting a 16 year old to know how to make that!

People can be overweight or obese but still be malnourished.

Some foods can cause obesity. Junk foods can stimulate receptors in the brain and become addictive, chains can be quite aggressive in their selling of junk food and persuasive to children. Cheap, filling, easy for working parents but without the proper nourishment needed by growing children.

ps Hull in the late 60s.

Firecracker Cheap basic cereal is junk food! It contains refined carbs, therefore calories which stop people starving, and sometimes fortified with a few other micronutrients, but it doesn't provide any of the other nutrients needed.

I've wondered about this topic for a long time. I think there are other threads about it.
I remember writing about a Jamie Oliver series where he tried to get people interested in making simple healthy meals.
They had to stop the series because so many viewers didn't even have a cooker, never mind pots and pans etc.
Things haven't changed much - I was working in a Hull dockland primary school where we had to sit with the children having their school dinners, showing them how to use a knife and fork instead of their fingers. The meals came from a huge central kitchen and wasn't all that tasty .
I later changed to another school where the food was cooked on the premises and the food was yum.

A lot of victim blaming and over-simplification going on on this thread. The causes of the rising levels of obesity in the population are enormously complex and will take a long time to explain. More and more is being understood about the role that gut health plays in our overall wellbeing, not just our digestive health. Even the way we give birth plays a part - the beneficial cocktail of micro organisms that babies receive from their mothers during normal birth and breastfeeding are vital to the process of 'seeding' a healthy gut. To attribute the problem of obesity to 'lazy parenting' misses the point entirely.

Chewbacca

^Many of todays youngsters/youths/adults don`t know how to cook.^

Exactly! Because it was decided to remove Domestic Science (or Food Technology) from the school curriculum. So we've got generations of people who've never been taught to cook a basic meal or learn the basics of food hygiene. And if their parents weren't able to cook, how were they ever going to learn. I'll bet that the majority of us on here did some cooking at school and learnt to make pastry, make a pie or a casserole, but who's teaching the younger generations now?

I never had Domestic Science lessons at school.
I learnt some from my mother, the rest has been learning on the job.
(I remember my first attempt at gravy which should really be best forgotten.)

I live in quite an affluent part of the country; think of footballers mansions and z lister "celebrities". We have 3 food banks in the town and several others in outlying villages. Every week, volunteers from a church come and collect any food and personal hygiene items to distribute to those in need. If there are families who are struggling to feed their children in this area, what on earth must it be like for deprived inner city areas where unemployment rates are high and income levels are low?

gillybob

Callistemon

Franbern the cost of food as a proportion of income is very low in this country, one of the lowest in the world in fact,

In 1957 we spent about 33% of average income on food compared to about 16% now.

And what percentage do we now pay on things like rent/mortgage , electric/gas, council tax ? Before we can even think about eating ?

Sorry Calendargirl I wasn’t being awkward . Just saying I wouldn’t want to go back to the way things were . Here in Tyneside we were well behind the more affluent areas . I lived in slum clearance until I was 8 years old which was 1970 ! Unbelievable to some .

gillybob I was merely quoting the statistics because Franbern said that post-war, expenditure on food was a lower proportion of household income, which is incorrect.
As a proportion of median income, it was twice what it is now. I can remember rationing but luckily we had a father who returned home in 1946 and was a keen gardener.

The cost of housing is another debate altogether.

Oops sorry GagaJo

We have the biggest foodbank in the country here in the North East (Newcastle) . I can’t even begin to imagine what it must be like to have to rely on the kindness of strangers ( often those with little to give themselves ) to feed your children .

I agree with Chewy and * GagaJo* there are some people who seem blind to the poverty in some parts of this country. They can’t see it in their leafy suburb so therefore it doesn’t exist .

Define poverty.

I could do that Firecracker but it's a very easy subject for you to research and educate yourself on if you wanted to. I could post statistics, data and examples of child poverty in Britain today but somehow, I don't think you'd be receptive to it. But the information is there if you choose to look for it.

Firecracker123

No excuse for not feeding your kids breakfast, cheap basic cereal and milk costs pennies. Breakfast clubs obviously if something is free some people will take it.

Beans on toast, large loaf £1, basic tin of beans 50p. No excuse.

Fat because you are poor no I don't think so fat because you are eating too much whether it's junk food or overeating any type of food in general.

I was a single mother with 2 kids on Family Credit I think it was called then, my kids were entitled to free school meals but wouldn't have them because of the stigma so I made them packed lunches. I made sure they had a good cooked meal everynight even when I was tired from working part time and a good breakfast, I always put their needs before mine.

The trouble with some Mothers today is they put their needs before their kids.

Your children were lucky you could afford food for packed lunches instead of their free school meals Firecracker. At my school, there were children who would come in when they were ILL because they wanted their school breakfast and lunch.

If a benefit doesn't cover all the rent and bills it is QED that it won't cover food.

I echo Chewbacca: None so blind as those that will not see.

I understand some having no sympathy for adults. But children? It beggars belief.

No excuse for not feeding your kids breakfast, cheap basic cereal and milk costs pennies. Breakfast clubs obviously if something is free some people will take it.

Beans on toast, large loaf £1, basic tin of beans 50p. No excuse.

Fat because you are poor no I don't think so fat because you are eating too much whether it's junk food or overeating any type of food in general.

I was a single mother with 2 kids on Family Credit I think it was called then, my kids were entitled to free school meals but wouldn't have them because of the stigma so I made them packed lunches. I made sure they had a good cooked meal everynight even when I was tired from working part time and a good breakfast, I always put their needs before mine.

The trouble with some Mothers today is they put their needs before their kids.

A lot of schools hold "outgrown" clothes which parents take along so that they can be taken by the children whose parents can't afford uniforms. A brilliant idea and a great help to the parents. Free of charge.
It's a start at least and will give more lee-way to buying food instead of the added worry of having to purchase uniforms as well.

Today 00:01 paddyanne

No local markets where I live and its one of the most deprived areas in Scotland.

Your beloved EU has not done where you live any favours it seems.

Alexa, I too was a nurse in the 70's. I was very slim and fit. But that was because nursing was very hands on and busy. Walking to and from work to save bus fare, a heavy, busy day, and often being put on a split shift. That meant walking to work, a full and heavy morning, walking home for four hours then back to it to help with the late shift. Long corridors, running across the campus to take or collect some thing. If id had a fitbit in those days I would have been star pupil.
Nursing today has changed so that there is often lifting equipment, tons of computer work and no canteen. Also, most people are in and out in a flash so the workload is higher as there are more admissions and discharges leading to …...sigh....more computer work.

Incidentaly, any period of time spent working a night shift has been seen as an indicator for some issues such as obesity, high blood pressure etc. and I did one heck of a lot of nights.

Or because it's just not wanting to see it Gagajo. None so blind as those that will not see.

Firecracker123 Sun 26-Jul-20 10:59:49
No excuse there are no poor people now or poor kids no one needs to go hungry in the UK only lazy mothers and fathers who are too idle to do some basic cooking. How much does basic cereal and milk cost to make, toast and peanut butter for breakfast. Free school dinners and vouchers now when on school holiday. Egg or beans on toast for tea. Homemade veg soup, veggie pasta etc.

Blinkered. Walk into a Northumberland school in an area decimated by the elimination of the mines and ship building. Many, many children from poor families. Thank god that there was a good foodbank near my school. Many of those children relied on the school Breakfast Club, or they would have nothing to eat first thing. Thank goodness for free school meals. Many of those children would be lucky to have beans on toast for dinner, or whatever their parents could get from the food bank. Which doesn't tend to be fresh food.

Poverty is still here. Universal credit doesn't cover everything. For many, the rent proportion is massively underfunded. What are families with children to do? If they don't pay the rent, they risk eviction. Food is one thing they can economise on and the £5 frozen food meal (listed above) would feed some families for 2 meals.

If you don't see poverty, it's either because where you live is more affluent OR because you're not looking.

Chewbacca

Define poverty.

Is unemployment a cause of obesity? I was never unemployed or underemployed and I was never too fat. As a school child I was in class , or doing supervised prep, or games, or asleep. The little leisure time we had was snack free and we never considered snacking the subject never came up.

When I went to be a nurse the food provided by the hospital was really good quality, but none of the nurses was fat.Not one nurse was fat, not even the matron. Now nurses generally seem to be fat . Why is this?

No excuse there are no poor people now or poor kids no one needs to go hungry in the UK only lazy mothers and fathers who are too idle to do some basic cooking

Whaaatt? There are no poor people or poor kids in Britain? Have you been living under a rock? What an ill informed comment this is. You need to educate yourself on what life is like for many families who are living below the poverty line.

A report last week from the Government's Social Mobility Commission concluded that there are now '600,000 more children… living in relative poverty' than in 2012. The report went on to say: 'Child poverty rates are projected to increase to 5.2 million by 2022.22. Jun 2020

The survey found that men are more likely than women to be overweight or obese (67.2% of men, 61.5% of women). People aged 65-74 are most likely to be overweight or obese.

From the house of commons library statistics for 2019.

I think it’s a pity children can’t get outside to play anymore, we always were out and about on our bikes from an early age, it taught us self reliance for sure. Parents these days are quite rightly worried about their children doing that, we never heard of the daily crimes and murders reported as it is now. It is easy to sit in front of a computer or television and snack on convenience food. I am overweight since going into lockdown, mainly eating because of boredom or loneliness, which I know is ridiculous.

My 2 DGD in Nottingham have both had cooking lessons at school and one is even contemplating becoming a chef because she has had such praise at school.
As for poverty causing obesity: There are several refugee families living in our town - from war torn Syria - who come to the community meal. None of them is obese. I realise this is a very small example but I do think we have got it all wrong in society and the remedy needs to come from all sides.

I can hardly believe that a huge opportunity offered in the wake of with the virus and subsequent lockdown hasn't woken people up to the fact that our lifestyles are just not sustainable.
Cheap food comes at a huge cost to the planet .
cheap travel comes at a huge cost to the planet
etc, etc, etc