We Are What We Eat
Sydney Morning Herald
Tuesday February 8, 2005
Australians are living in fast times. High wealth, high debt. Many options. Crowded schedules. Fast food. It is not necessarily a healthy lifestyle, especially the part about fast food. Australia now trails only the United States on the obesity league table among advanced economies. Almost half of adult males are overweight or obese. One in three adult women are overweight or obese. One in five children are obese or overweight. A new report proves that nearly all of us know what to do about healthy eating, but the majority of us fall into bad habits and bad examples and bad patterns for children.
A study released at the weekend by the Dietitians Association of Australia, and conducted by the association and the drug company Pfizer, found that 50 per cent of families watch television while eating - a habit with a demonstrable link with fast food. Working parents often do not have time to prepare a home-cooked meal with fresh ingredients for themselves and their children. The study also found that parents wrongly assume they can take a short cut to health through fruit juices and fruit-flavoured drinks. They cannot. Fruit drinks, especially, are loaded with sugar, and even juices are sugary. They are a contributor to the obesity problem among children. It is not just the food we eat. It is the way we live and the way we treat children. Once a lean society, Australia exhibits the affectations of affluence. Children have become much more sedentary. If the backyard exists, no longer is it the playground it was. Children spend more time sitting - sitting watching TV, sitting at the computer, sitting sending mobile phone text messages. This should be a cause for concern, but parents, equally addicted to labour-saving technology, are being conditioned to wrap their children in cotton wool. Television, the internet and the mobile phone exhibit the same thrall on older generations as on teenagers. Longer working hours and higher and higher levels of debt mean that Australians are working more to own more and consume more. The dietitians tell us we need to take time out to eat better, more slowly and as a family. In other words, fast food is a false economy of time. This latest survey reveals a gulf between knowledge and execution. We know what we should do; we just need to do it. We need less talk and more action.
© 2005 Sydney Morning Herald