NHS

I do agree about fructose being more harmful than other sugars.

Surely if you have orange juice you do not have to have 200ml. You can drink half of that.

Of course you can jen but 100ml isn't very much. Less than a very small glass of wine.

Add water.

Back to the NHS. Here is our experience from the other night. DH as a dental abscess which refused to respond to antibiotics. On Tuesday night he was in more agony than even he could bear. His face was swollen. His eye was closing and the pain went into his temple and behind his ear. His temperature was through the roof.

We decided to look for a out of hours dentist. Unfortunately there have been cut backs in our area and the out of hours system no longer runs after 8pm so I phoned 111. I explained about the swelling etc and they said that he should go to a and e even though they don't usually send dental patients there. We were to explain to the receptionist why we had been sent and that DH needed to be seen preferably within an hour.

On arrival a and e was heaving. We explained what 111 had told us. The receptionist told us that it didn't matter what 111 said. They didn't do teeth and we'd have to go to the out of hours dentist. We explained that it wasn't open. She checked then said that we could wait but it would be hours then perhaps someone from maxo-facial would come down if they weren't too busy in surgery (this was 2am). Basically she told us to get lost but not in so many words. DH didn't want to stay there and there seemed little point if we were going to sit for hours and then not even see anyone who could help.

We went home, phoned our dentist at 8am and was seen that day.

He eventually got treatment so why am I so upset? Well we found out that if we'd been able to pay a £75 call out charge and then £150 per hour we'd have been able to see a dentist within the hour. But because we rely on the decimated NHS service DH had to continue to suffer. Punished for being poor.

Yes and we must make sure it doesn't happen to the rest of the medical services.

Of course you can dilute fruit juice jen, but that makes it a different drunk and doesn't alter the fact that a glass of juice the size that many people consider normal, contains more sugar than a piece of fruit does.
It's like controlling your calorie intake by mixing shredded cardboard into your breakfast cereal.

Except that water is a good drink and cardboard isn't good food

Drink!!

It's also possible to live heathily and never drink fruit juice at all.

Yes Bags. Personally I prefer to drink my 80ml orange juice, and then later on, my 200ml water.
I find diluting fresh juice in a ratio greater than 2:1 juice to water leads to a very insipid flavour, which is why fruit squashes are loaded with sugar or artificial sweetener.
Yesterday in a restaurant the table water was served with slices of cucumber in it. Way to go

I squeeze an orange every morning at breakfast and drink that. They are really good at the moment.

Cucumber in water! Why on earth? Why not just eat cucumber?

Weirder and weirder.

I just don't drink fruit juice. It rips my guts out, especially orange juice. Poison!

Childhood obesity in the UK has begun to fall, although adult obesity continues to rise. There are strong regional and socio-economic links to obesity.

If the government can't/won't do anything about obesity, why does it spend so much money monitoring it and insisting that every school age child is weighed?

I'm afraid I don't think the sugar tax on soft drinks will make much difference, if any.

I agree with you, thatbags. I can't stomach fruit (or any) juices. The juicing fad amazes me, because it's marketed as a healthy option when it isn't.

Does squeezing an orange with an old fashioned squeezer then putting all the fibrous bits into the glass with the juice count? Or can it just be seen as eating and orange?

Haven't a clue, ww, but if you like it, I don't suppose it will do much harm. :-)

The whole idea of whole food groups being 'bad' is ludicrous anyway. We need carbohydrates as a cheap and efficient form of energy and sugar is the most efficient form - but loads of us eat too much of it, often because it's hidden away and don't know how much we're eating.

In any case, this is putting the 'blame' on the consumer. The main problem with the NHS is that it's underfunded for what people expect.

Sounds like a way of eating an orange to me, ww. There is probably the juice of more than one orange in a glass of ready made orange juice though. Wotevs: my guts just can't take that amount of fruit acid.

I take issue with this idea about "hidden" carbohydrates (straight sugar or otherwise). I don't think ingredients are hidden: the contents of packeted food have to be clearly pronted on the packet. Take a Supermarket brand Cornish pasty, for instance: if the ingredients list says "meat 18%" it's bloody obvious that the rest is mainly carbohydrate and fat since Cornish pasties are basically meat and potato with pastry and a few bits and bobs of other stuff. It's elementary, my dear Watson, as Holmes never said.

I don't agree with you, thatbags. How many people actually know how many carbohydrates they should be eating for their body six and activity level? Very few!

How many people buy fruit juice and many other foodstuffs because they're marketed as 'healthy'? Many!

Of course there are 'hidden' carbohydrates in many of the foodstuffs we buy. People are being fed so many conflicting messages.

People make billions selling all sorts of diet plans and spurious claims about various super foods, supplements and so called forbidden foods.

The trouble is that the NHS really hasn't got to grips with reality, nor has the government. Obesity is a problem, which is likely to lead to ill health and premature deaths, but it really isn't to do with sugar-laden fizzy drinks.

typo six = size

I don't know how many carbohydrates I supposedly "should" be eating, dd. I do know, however, that a balance of proteins, fats and carbohydrates is good so that's what I aim for. It is not difficult to do that and I am certain (yes, I do mean certain) that exact amounts don't matter so long as the balance is more or less right and you are getting a sufficient supply of minerals and vitamins from a varied diet. Having a varied diet in developed countries that have access to food from all over the world is not difficult.

I find it hard to understand how so many people are taken in by spurious claims but I accept that a certain amount of that is happening. I also think that people quite often have their heads in the sand and just want to blame someone else for their eating problems. I truly believe that anyone who can read, who has ever heard of the idea of moderation in all things, and who has the will to do it, can eat healthily enough for normal purposes without needing to know a great deal about the details of nutrition.

My paternal grandmother was virtually illiterate but she managed to understand that much and to get on with it including during periods of great poverty.

I don't know how big you are, thatbags, but you should probably be eating about 200-250g of carbs every day, which will give you 800-1000 calories or about half of your energy requirement. All carbs eventually break down to glucose, so you want to choose the ones which will take longest to break down eg. not simple sugars, although they won't kill you, if eaten in moderation. I bet your grandmother knew that. Fat slows down the digestion of carbs. It's always amazed me that traditional foods, such as cheese on toast, a bit of butter on a baked potato, etc. are reasonably healthy options without people knowing anything at all about nutrition.

I agree with you about not needing to know much about the science of nutrition to eat healthily enough. I don't understand why the supplements and 'superfoods' market is worth millions when the simple truth, as you say, is moderation in all things.

The NHS claims that obesity costs billions. If that's the case, the government needs to come up with some effective public health messages, which don't make it sound like a 'nanny state'.