Unfortunately, the media love the words "junk food" and use them at every opportunity. TVNZ One News published an article under the heading
"NZ's 'obesity crisis' won't be solved by dairy sweet ban - health expert".
Quoting from the article: A new report from Auckland Regional Public Health Service has called for limits on how many convenience stores can set up in one area, and what foods they can sell to children. The proposals were made in a report to obesity-fighting group Healthy Auckland Together, which plans to lobby for changes to the Resource Management Act to allow councils to govern where dairies, takeaways and other convenience stores can set up.
Speaking to TV ONE's Breakfast this morning, Boyd Swinburn, Professor of Population Nutrition and Global Health, said New Zealand could even consider a trial of a junkfood exclusion zone for dairies within a certain distance to a school, as is the case in Korea.
The liberal use of the term "junk food" in the article is an inappropriate catch-all. Do the authors mean to include hamburgers, pizza or fish and chips along with sweets? It can be argued that a hamburger is highly nutritious - protein (meat and possibly cheese), carbohydrate, salad vegetables. Possibly the sauce contains too much sugar. Another colleague, food technologist Garth Wallace, once said that a serve of fish and chips with some bread and butter and a glass of beer was a balanced meal.
The problem is not the food; it's the consumption pattern. If you eat hamburgers for every meal, you will soon begin to feel unwell, as demonstrated in a recent television documentary broadcast in New Zealand. In addition, Tim Spector, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology at King's College, London, has published an article in The Conversation, "Your gut bacteria don't like junk food, even if you do". Note once again the words used to describe the diet. The article described an experiment carried out with his son Tom, who changed from an average western diet to an intensive fast food diet for a week. Tom's gut bacteria were analysed over the course of the experiment. "Tom’s gut had seen massive shifts in his common microbe groups for reasons that are still unclear. Firmicutes were replaced with Bacteroidetes as the dominant type, while friendly bifidobacteria that suppress inflammation halved. However the clearest marker of an unhealthy gut is losing species diversity and after just a few days Tom had lost an estimated 1,400 species – nearly 40% of his total. The changes persisted and even two weeks after the diet his microbes had not recovered".
The problem is not the food; it's the consumption pattern. If you eat hamburgers for every meal, you will soon begin to feel unwell, as demonstrated in a recent television documentary broadcast in New Zealand. In addition, Tim Spector, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology at King's College, London, has published an article in The Conversation, "Your gut bacteria don't like junk food, even if you do". Note once again the words used to describe the diet. The article described an experiment carried out with his son Tom, who changed from an average western diet to an intensive fast food diet for a week. Tom's gut bacteria were analysed over the course of the experiment. "Tom’s gut had seen massive shifts in his common microbe groups for reasons that are still unclear. Firmicutes were replaced with Bacteroidetes as the dominant type, while friendly bifidobacteria that suppress inflammation halved. However the clearest marker of an unhealthy gut is losing species diversity and after just a few days Tom had lost an estimated 1,400 species – nearly 40% of his total. The changes persisted and even two weeks after the diet his microbes had not recovered".
In my opinion, this is clear evidence that a proper balanced diet is the right way to maintain a healthy body and gut microbiome. The components of the diet are much less important than the relative proportions and frequency of consumption.
This article represents my own opinions, and is not necessarily the view of NZIFST.
