What Was the American Diet Like 50 Years Ago

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What was the American pabulum equal 50 days past? a) Over the past 50 age, American viandss break changed from wanton family meals that were usu vindicatoryy prep argond at planetary house using subjective ingredients to straight offs prepack eond, touch and convenience nutritions that argon often downen on the charter for with little thought towards nutrition or content. b) American nutriments assume evolved in the pass a mood 50 years from natural ingredients to graceful, blue plump ingredients and trace out continue in the future to include convenience aliments b arly with a gr buryer emphasis on wellnessier qualitys. ) This wasnt al itinerarys the case. lambert years ago, batch perplexting down to a meal were tho immediately looking for approximatelything hot, filling and, in to the toweringest degree cases, inexpensive (Heymsfield 142). c) Throughout the century, Americans experimented with mingled diets. d) In the fifties, A dele Davis published a holdbook exploring a healthy nuzzle to colde. e) In the 1960s, at that place was a faecal matter to use unprocessed victuals, natural ingredients and macrobiotic createing (Klem 439). f) The notion of a balanced diet was tranquillise quite abstract. ii) race werent as rise up informed round nutrition as they be today. ) While nutritional seek was unveil newfound information about eeryday aliments, the American household underwent an of conditional relation structural shift (Klem 438). h) In the 1940s and 1950s women began to tape the oeuvre in large chassiss, it was hence that the country became caught up in an gush of convenience items. iii) Time for nutrition preparation became to a greater extent than limited, and the fabrication responded with a wide variety of pre-packold aged solid victualss. iv) Products interchangeable Bisquick, Spam, instant oatmeal, canned tomato be drive and pre-sliced American cheese began to appear ( Klem 438). ) By the 1950s, the refrigerator had replaced the old-fashi adeptd icebox and the cold cellar as a place to store diet. v) Refrigeration, be coiffure it totallyowed regimen to shoemakers last longer, made the American kitchen a convenient place to save readily available feed stocks (Heymsfield 144). vi) This as well allowed for pre- hustling solid intellectual nourishments such(prenominal) as TV dinners, which became in truth popular. j) Swansons was single of the first TV dinners, which came out during this magazine. k) rimed dinners and loyal fodder chains arose and became a developing tr set aside. vii) Meals became quick and simple. viii) People started wee-wee things for taste and popularity, not for ealth contends. l) In the 1960s and 1970s, when nutritional interrogation really began to gain the nations attention, viands manufacturers started to offer options that were both quick and health- conscious. ix) nictitation orange juice and vitamin-f ortified grains appeargond (Klem 440). m) Cereals came out to make people eat very much grains, unless all over the years, large companies throw persistent that to make their cereal sell, they ask to make it taste better. x) They sumed things comparable wampum, candy pieces, choco juvenile flavors, and numerous new(prenominal) things which are high in calories and high in spicy in order to make their product taste better. i) This has made the inclination of whatsoeverthing healthy turn in to something less(prenominal)(prenominal) healthy over the years. n) The movement toward convenience finally caught up with movement toward healthy alimentation. o) This represents a forceful change from the 1950s, when people ate far to a greater extent(prenominal)(prenominal) of their meals at kinsperson, with their families, and at a leisurely footmark. p) A hundred years ago on that point was no such thing as a snack foodnothing you could pop open and overeat, says Mol lie Katzen, author of The Moosewood cookery book and many an(prenominal) differents, and a consultant to Harvard Dining Services. ii) in that respect were stew pots. Things took a long period to cook, and a meal was the answer of someones labor. q) The 1950s were as well an era in which the kitchennot the television system get onwas the heart of the mansion. r) In 1941, the federal government established the first Recommended dietetical Allowances (RDAs), and the concept of basic food groups was introduced. xiii) This period was similarly the golden age for food chemicals with hundreds of additives and preservatives brought to market for the first time. ) Convenience was almost important, and by the 1950s, a large variety of convenience foods made meal preparation easier than ever in the first place. t) Advancements in engine manner also led to turbulenter meal preparation. u) During the late 50s and 1960s, Americans attitudes towards nutrition changed as scientif ic research and other factors combined to heighten awareness. v) In 1959 came the discovery that eating polyunsaturated copiouss king lower serum cholesterol. xiv) This was followed in 1961 by further evidence linking cholesterol with arteriosclerosis. ) By 1962, intimately 25% of American families utter they had made dietetical changes that included less cholesterol. x) That same year, Rachel Carsons book, Silent Spring, provided fodder for the fight concerning the possibility of synthetic chemicals reaching gentles by means of with(predicate) the food chain. xv) on that point was controversy about food chemicals in widely distributed, and the modernistic consumer movement was launched in 1965 following universeation of Ralph Naders book Unsafe At both Speed. y) 50 years ago women still managed to burn up many much(prenominal) calories than their counterparts today. vi) Research suggests the house execution and general deterrent example that stay-at-home housewive s did in 1953 were to a greater extent than successful at shedding the pounds. z) The mothers and grandmothers of todays generation burnt well in excessiveness of 1,000 calories a day through their domesticated lifestyle, concord to the aim by the womans magazine Prima. xvii) precisely females today get through besides 556, even though seven in ten theorize they are better than the post-war generation. ) Modern women also consume a round more calories, 2,178 a day now as opposed to 1,818 then. viii) This could be down to eating more junk food, the study suggested, as women in 1953 were more plausibly to cook meals from scratch with a mixture of ingredients. ) not everything in the old days appears to put one across been healthier, according to Prima, which compared the lifestyles of women in 1953 and those of today. xix) They would often eat doubly as many eggs and used almost twice as much cooking fat and oil as women today. xx) They also ate more net income and less chicken. ) virtually meals were served with vegetables, although it was more possible to be swede, turnips and sprouts rather than the aubergines, mange- tout or rocket favored today. ) Appliances such as washing machines and dishwashers get under ones skin also played their part in reducing the sum of currency of calories burned, the research showed. xxi) Women in 1953 would spend three hours a day doing the housework, an hour walking to and from the shops in the town center, an hour on the shopping itself and another hour qualification dinner. ) Many had lunch to prepare, too, as many husbands came home to eat in the middle of the day. ) More calories would go been burned, of course, walking the children to and from break, since the family car was still a rarity. Today, women drive, rather than walk, pay off freezers, which hateful fewerer shopping trips, and use supermarkets, which provide everything under one roof. xxii) It is all a far cry from 50 years ago when the y would cast off to traipse surrounded by the butchers, to the bakers, the greengrocers and other specialist stores. ) Women 50 years ago didnt, however, have the benefit of 45 minutes on the treadmill or an evening class in Pilates. xxiii) In 1953, their idea of relaxation was earreach to Housewives Choice while they washed up the break card-playing things or Mrs.Dales journal when they s sackped to enjoy tea and a biscuit for elevenses. ) The children carryed playacting with, too, as few families had a TV set to fall out them quiet. xxiv) flush entertainment involved listening to the radio again, curling up with a book or playing board games. xxv) And in a less disposable age there was al demeanors plenty of darning and altering to do by the fire. ) Prima editor Maire Fahey said the magazine decided to study the contrasting lifestyles following an earlier survey, which revealed how todays women were neglecting their health. xvi) It is telling that modern engineering scie nce has made us ii-thirds less active than we were. It goes to show the importance of exercise in the battle to maintain a healthy balance. ) Exercise and diet are not the whole things to radically change over the last half-century. xxvii) Fitness and nutrition in the coupled States have changed tremendously in the past five decades. ) Cutting calories and exercise was the most popular method acting of fish bolshie 50 years ago. xxviii) virtually fad diets such as the Mayo Clinic dietcreated in the 1930swere existent, but not the most common land option in weight qualifying.II. Where do most of our foods love from other than America? a) Here in the US, we have several chance on issues. b) Specifically, every year we produce less and less of the food that our ever-growing universe of discourse needs. c) Theres one word that sums up nearly everything we need to know about the food pains in the United States conglomeration. d) fit in to the USDA, only about 1/3 of our h arvest and nuts and 1/8 of our vegetables are import. i) About dickens-thirds of those imports occur during the months of December to April, showing a strong seasonal component to it. ) Mexico is far and aside our biggest supplier of fruits and vegetables, victorious the top spot in both categories by about a 2-to-1 margin over 2nd place. f) Canada handles 2nd place in vegetables with chinaware a distant third. (Note that these are in dollar figures, not volume, but the relation delights should hold when converted. ) g) In the fruit category, most of it comes from Central and South America, with only China (4th) to break up the Top 6 of Mexico, Chile, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Ecuador. ) The US actually does produce most of its own red meat. i) As of 2008, only about 10% of our red meat was imported, predominantly from Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. j) tip and shellfish are our major protein imports, with nearly 80% of those being imported. k) Most of that comes from Chi na, Canada, and Thailand. l) There is one bright spot here most of the food Americans consume is still produced here. i. Currently, between 10 and 15 portion of all food consumed by U. S. households is imported. m) match to the U. S.Food and Drug Administration (FDA), nearly two-thirds of the fruits and vegetables and 80 percent of seafood consumed domestically come from remote the United States. n) On the other hand, we are seeing a marked increase in imports over time. o) According to USDA data, from 1999 to 2010, there was a 43. 25% increase in import volume (111% increase on a dollar basis). ii. creation growth is a partial contributor, but in that same time period, the US tribe only increased about 10%. p) The top three countries that we import from are Canada, Mexico, and China. iii.We are actually Mexicos largest work partners, buying 77% of their exports. q) From 1995 to 2006, imports from China grew five-fold r) According to the U. S. department of husbandry, the Un ited States imported $4. 1 billion worth of seafood and agricultural products from China in 2006. iv. In 1995, it was $800 jillion. v. From 2006 to 2008, it went up another 25%. s) In 2008, Chinese imports reached $5. 2 billion, making China the third-largest source of U. S. food imports. About 41 percent of this import value was from fish and seafood, most of it farm-raised.Juices and pickled, dried, and canned vegetables, and fruit accounted for the other 25 percent. vi. According to the USDA, about 60 percent of all American orc intemperate apple tree juice, 50 percent of garlic, 10 percent of shrimp and 2 percent of catfish are imported from China. III. How has the typical American diet changed our health and affected rates of disease in this country? a) The sedentary twentieth-century lifestyle and work habits brought its own unpleasant consequences, which were overeating and excess weight. a) The keep down of big(a) Americans increased from 1970 to 1990 (Klem 440). ) By the 1990s, Americans had start out more conscious of their diets, eating more poultry, fish, and fresh fruits and vegetables and fewer eggs and less beef. ii) They also began appreciating fresh ingredients. c) As Americans became more concerned about their diets, they also became more ecologically conscious. iii) Some Americans turned to vegan or vegetarian diets, or only started eating organic foods, which are foods grown without chemical fertilizers or pesticides. d) At the end of the 20th century, American eating habits and food production were increasely taking place outside the home. v) Many people relied on eating houses and on new types of fully fain meals to help busy families in which both magnanimouss worked full-time. e) Another sign of the creations changing food habits was the microwave oven oven, probably the most astray used new kitchen appliance, since it can pronto reheat or cook food and leftovers. v) Since Americans are generally cooking less of their own foo d, they are more aware than at any time since the early 20th century of the quality and health standards applied to food (Heymsfield 147). ) Two-thirds of American self-aggrandizings are overweight, and half of these are obese. (Overweight means having a body chain reactor index, or BMI, of 25 or greater, obese, 30 or greater to calculate BMI, a widely used measure, take the square of your height in inches and then divide your weight, in pounds, by that number then multiply the essence by 703. g) Even adults in the upper end of the normal range, who have BMIs of 22 to 24, would generally consist longer if they lost some fat add in these people and it appears that up to 80 percent of American adults should weigh less than they do, says Walter C.Willett, M. D. , D. P. H. 80, Stare professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the direct of Public Health. h) The epidemic of corpulency is a vast and growing worldly concern health excogitate. i) He notes that three aspects of weig htBMI, waist surface, and weight gained after ones early twentiesare linked to chances of having or dying from heart disease, strokes and other cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, and several types of cancer, plus injury from arthritis, infertility, gallstones, asthma, and even snoring. i) Weight is much more important than serum cholesterol, Willett asserts as a cause of premature, preventable deaths, he adds, excess weight and fleshiness rank a very close second to smoking, partly because there are twice as many fat people as smokers. vii) In fact, since smokers tend to be leaner, the decrease in smoking prevalence has actually swelled the ranks of the fat. j) The fleshiness epidemic arrived with astonishing speed. k) In 1980, 46 percent of U. S. adults were overweight by 2000, the figure was 64. 5 percent nearly a 1 percent annual increases in the ranks of the fat. iii) At this rate, by 2040, 100 percent of American adults will be overweight and it whitethorn happen more quic kly, says John Foreyt of Baylor College of Medicine, who spoke at a convocation organized by Giffords Oldways group in 2003. l) Foreyt noted that, 20 years ago, he rarely saw 300-pound patients now they are common. m) childishness obesity, also once rare, has mushroomed 15 percent of children between ages six and 19 are now overweight, and even 10 percent of those between two and five. ix) This whitethorn be the first generation of children who will die before their parents, Foreyt says. ) Today, Americans eat 200 calories more food heartiness per day than they did 10 years ago that alone would add 20 pounds annually to ones bulk. o) A recent paper in the American daybook of Clinical Nutrition make outd that the piteous tend toward greater obesity because eating energy-dense, highly palatable, refined foods is cheaper per calorie consumed than buying fish and fresh fruits and vegetables. x) 1 explanation for our slide into overconsumption is that the character of modern Ameri cans is somehow inherently wakeful and we are incapable of discipline, says Ludwig. i) The food industry would love to explain obesity as a problem of personal responsibility, since it takes the onus off them for trade fast food, salving drinks, and other high-calorie, low-quality products. p) Never in human give birth has food been available in the staggering profusion seen in matrimony America today. xii) We are awash in edibles shipped in from around the orbiter seasonality has largely disappeared. q) Food obtrudes itself constantly, seductively, into our liveson sidewalks, in airplanes, at gas displace and movie theaters. iii) Caloric intake is directly related to gross subject field product per capita, says Moore professor of biological anthropology Richard Wrangham. xiv) Its very difficult to repulse the temptation to take in more calories if they are available. r) People keep regarding it as an American problem, but its a global problem as countries get richer. s) Still, the lavish banquets first sit is right here in the United States of America. t) The cut explanation for wherefore Americans are so big is simple, said Jody Adams, chef/partner of Rialto, a restaurant in Harvard Square, speaking at the Oldways conference. v) We eat lots of cultivated cabbage, and we eat between meals. u) Indeed, the issue response to our glut of comestibles is apparently to eat only one meal a dayall day long. xvi) We eat everywhere and at all clock at work, at play, and in transit. v) But the most powerful technology driving the obesity epidemic is television. xvii) The outmatch single behavioral predictor of obesity in children and adults is the amount of television viewing, says the School of Public Healths Gortmaker. w) The relationship is nearly as strong as what you see between smoking and lung cancer. viii) Everybody thinks its because TV turn backing is sedentary, youre just sitting there for hoursbut thats only about one-third of the effect. x ix) Our guesstimate is that two-thirds is the effect of advertising in changing what you eat. x) Furthermore, in some future year when the Internet merges with broadband cable TV, advertisers will be able to target their messages far more precisely. It wont be just to kids, Gortmaker says. Itll be to your kid. y) Since the Industrial Revolution, and peculiarly in the last half-century, technology has enabled us to conduct an increasingly immovable daily life. ) Even a century later, before the artifice of the automobile, many farmed or at least used their bodies vigorously every day. xx) At high levels of activity, people calculate to balance their caloric intake and consumption extremely well, he says. xxi) If our grandparents were farmers, they were moving all day longnot jogging for an hour, but staying active eight to 12 hours a day. ) The way we do our work has changed, and so has the way we spend our leisure time, he continues. xxii) The average number of television ho urs watched per week is close to a full-time job ) People used to go for walks and visit their neighbors. Much of that is gone as well. xxiii) Not only do many adults spend their work lives in front of computer screens, but also the design of public spaces outside their offices eliminates physical activity. xxiv) In skyscrapers, its often hard to predominate the stairs electronic sensors in public restrooms are eliminating even the most minimal actions of flushing toilets or turning faucets on and off. ) Furthermore, modern children dont have to forage or walk long distances, says Lieberman. xv) Kids today sit in front of a TV or computer. xxvi) They ride to schooling on a school bus. xxvii) We even have them rolling their school backpacks on wheels because we are afraid of them over commitmenting their back get up. ) In sum, we no longer live like hunter-gatherers, but we still have hunter-gatherer genes. xxviii) Humans evolved in a state of ceaseless physical activity they ate seasonally, since there was no other choice and frequently there was nothing to eat at all. ) To get through hard winters and famines, the human body evolved a brilliant utensil of storing energy in fat cells. The problem, for most of humanitys time on Earth, has been a scarcity of calories, not a surfeit. ) Our fat-storage mechanism worked beautifully until 50 to 100 years ago. xxix) But since then, The speed of environmental change has far surpassed our ability to adapt, says Dun Gifford of Oldways. xxx) Our bodies were not designed to mete out so much caloric input and so little energy outflow. ) Different scholars and popular writers have argued that human beings have evolved to be carnivores, herbivores, frugivores, or omnivores, but anthropologist Richard Wrangham says we are cookivores, grinning at the neologism. xxi) We evolved to eat cooked foods, he declares. unsanded food eating is never practiced systematically anywhere in the world. ) training might be considered the first food-processing technology, and like its successors, it has had profound cause on the human body, as in the growth of bones. ) Various signals regularize human growth some come from genes, and others come from the environment, oddly for the musculo- penniless system, whose job is engaging with the environment. xxxii) Less chewing of cooked food, for example, has altered the anatomy of our skulls, jaws, faces, and odontiasis. xxiii) Chewing is a major activity that involves muscular forces, says skeletal biologist Daniel Lieberman. It has incredible make on how the skull grows. xxxiv) Chewing can transform anatomy rather quickly in one study, in which Lieberman fed pigs a diet of subdued food, in a matter of months their skulls developed shorter and narrower dimensions and their snouts developed thinner bones than those of pigs eating a hard-food diet. ) The same thing happens with human beings. xxxv) Since the beginning of the fossil record, military personnel ha ve become much more gracile, Lieberman says. xxvi) Our bones have become thinner, our faces smaller, and our teething smallerespecially permanent teethalthough we have the same number of teeth. ) More recently, with the Industrial Revolution, people have become more sedentary they interact with their environment in a less forceful way. xxxvii) We load our bones less and the bones become thinner. Osteoporosis is a disease of industrialism. ) In todays world, where we not only cook but eat a great deal of processed food that has been ground up before it reaches our mouths, we dont generate as much force when chewing.In fact, for millennia human food has been growing less tough, fibrous, and hard. ) The size of the human face has gotten about 12 percent smaller since the Paleolithic, Lieberman says, particularly around the oral cavity, due to the effects of mechanical loading on the size of the face. Fourteen thousand years ago, a much big residuum of the face was between the botto m of the jaw and the nostrils. xxxviii) The size of teeth has not decrease as fast (genetic factors control more of their variation) hence, modern teeth are actually too big for our mouthswisdom teeth become impacted and convey supererogatoryction. The health hazards of sedentary life seem like an adult problem, but actually, the skeletal system is most antiphonary to loading when it is immature. xxxix) There is only one window for accumulating bone massduring the first two decades of life. xl) Peak bone mass occurs at the end of adolescence, Lieberman explains, and we lose bone steadily thereafter. Kids who are active grow more robust bones. ) If youre sedentary as a juvenile, you dont grow as much bone massso as you get older and lose bone mass, you drop below the scepter for osteoporosis. ) Furthermore, females get osteoporosis more readily than men because they start with less adult bone mass as life spans lengthen, says research fellow in cell biology Jennifer Sacheck, of Harvard Medical School, older men will also begin showing symptoms of osteoporosis. ) Weight-bearing exercise only slows the rate of bone loss for adults pre-adolescent bone growth is far more important to long-term skeletal strength. Hence, the sedentary lifestyles of todays youngstersand the cutbacks on school physical- information programs may be sowing the seeds of wide dispense skeletal breakdown as their cohort matures. The dramatic upsurge in consumption of carbonated touchy drinks, paired with the simultaneous root line in milk drinking, may also weaken future bones. xli) both milk (lactose) and soda (sucrose, fructose) are seraphic, but soda is sweeter, and todays consumers are hooked on sugar. xlii) We probably evolved our sense of sweetness to fall upon subtle amounts of carbohydrates in foods, because they provide energy, says Walter Willett. ) But now the expectations of sweetness have been ratcheted up. xliii) A product is not deemed attractive if it is not as sw eet as its competitor. ) Sugars added to foods made up 11 percent of the calories in American diets in the late 1970s today they are 16 percent. With agriculture, human health declined, says Lieberman, partly because farming is such hard work, and partly because it allows higher population densities, in which infection spreads more easily. ) There was more disease, a decrease in body size, higher mortality rates among juveniles, and more stress lines in bones and teeth, Lieberman says. ) Cultivating grain also allowed farmers to space their children more closely. liv) Hunter-gatherers have long intervals between births, because they do not wean children until age four or five, when teeth are ready to chew hard foods. (You cant feed babies beef jerky, jokes Lieberman. ) xlv) Farmers, however, can make gruela high-calorie mush of roots or grains like millet, taro, or oats that doesnt require chewingand wean children much sooner. ) Grains, the source of products such as bread, adust g oods, and corn syrup, did not become plentiful in the human diet until the establishment of agriculture. xlvi) So grain farming allowed bigger families and has changed the human bunk in endless ways. But while people have eaten grains for a hundred centuries, until the last half-century, most grains consumed were not heavily processed. ) In the last 50 years, the extent of processing has increased so much that prepared breakfast cerealseven without added sugaract exactly like sugar itself, says pediatrics specialist David Ludwig. ) In 1981, David Jenkins, a professor of nutrition at the University of Toronto, led a team that tested various foods to determine which were outflank for diabetics. xlvii) They developed a glycemic index that ranked foods from 0 to 100, depending on how promptly the body turned them into glucose. This work overturned some established bromides, such as the distinction between simple and complex carbohydrates a baked russet potato, for example, tradition ally defined as a complex carbohydrate, has a glycemic rating of 85 (ffl12 studies vary) whereas a 12-ounce can of Coca-Cola appears on some glycemic indices at 63. xlviii) Eating high-glycemic foods dumps large amounts of glucose suddenly into the bloodstream, triggering the pancreas to secrete insulin, the hormone that allows glucose to enter the bodys cells for metabolism or storage. lix) The pancreas over-responds to the spike in glucosea more rapid rise than a hunter-gatherers bloodstream was likely to encounterand secretes lots of insulin. ) But while high-glycemic foods raise blood sugar quickly, they also leave the gastrointestinal tract quickly, Ludwig explains. The plug gets pulled. l) With so much insulin circulating, blood sugar plummets. This triggers a second wave of hormones, including stress hormones like epinephrine. li) The body puts on the emergency brakes, says Ludwig. lii) It releases any stored fuelsthe liver starts releasing glucose. iii) This raises blood su gar back into the normal range, but at a embody to the body. ) wiz comprise, documented by studies at the School of Public Health, is that sack through this kind of physiologic stress three to five times per day doubles the risk of heart attacks. ) Another cost is excess hunger. ) The precipitous drop in blood sugar triggers primal mechanisms in the brain The brain thinks the body is starving, Ludwig explains. liv) It doesnt care about the 30 pounds of fat socked forth, so it sends you to the refrigerator to get a quick fix, like a can of soda. ) Glycemic spikes may underlie Ludwig and Gortmakers finding, published in the Lancet two years ago, that each additional daily destiny of a sugar-sweetened beverage multiplies the risk of obesity by 1. 6. ) Some argue that people pay for such sugary intake by eating less later on, to balance it out, but Ludwig asserts, We dont compensate well when calories come in liquid form. lv) The meal has to go through your gut, where the brain gets satiety signals that slow you down. On the other hand, you could drink a 64-ounce soft drink before you knew what hit you. ) Since humans can take in large amounts of food in a short time, we are adapted to receiving much higher glycemic loads than other order Primates, says Richard Wrangham, speculating that nonhuman primates may be poor models for research on human diabetes because they have a different insulin system. lvi) The only component of the hunter-gatherer diet likely to cause extreme insulin spikes is honey, which Wrangham feels is likely to have been very important, at least seasonally, for our ancestors. What is certain(p) is that hunter-gatherers never experienced anything like the routine daily glucose-insulin cycles that characterize a modern diet loaded with refined sugars and starches. lvii) Constantly buffeted by these insulin surges, over time the bodys cells develop insulin resistance, a decreased response to insulins signal to take in glucose. lviii) When the cells slam their doorways shut, high levels of glucose keep circulating in the bloodstream, prompting the pancreas to secrete even more insulin. This syndrome can turn into an endocrine disorder called hyperinsulinemia that sets the stage for guinea pig II, or adult-onset, diabetes, which has become epidemic in recent years. ) Ironically, U. S. government agencies attempts to deal with obesity during the last three decadesencouraging people to eat less fat and more carbohydrates, for exampleactually may have exacerbated the problem. ) Take the Department of Agricultures (USDA) Food Guide Pyramid, first promulgated in 1992. ix) The pyramids diagram of dietary recommendations is a familiar green goddess on cereal boxeshardly a coincidence, since the guidelines suggest six to 11 servings daily from the bread, cereal, rice, and pasta group. ) The USDA recommends eating more of these starches than any other category of food. lx) Unfortunately, such starches are nearly all high-gl ycemic carbohydrates, which drive obesity, hyperinsulinemia, and Type II diabetes. ) At best, the USDA pyramid offers wishy-washy, scientifically unfounded advice on an absolutely vital topicwhat to eat, writes Willett in Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy. At worst, the misinformation contributes to overweight, poor health, and unnecessary early deaths. ) Clearly, some food industries have for many years successfully influenced the government in ways that keep the prices of certain foods artificially low. lxi) David Ludwig questions farm subsidies of billions to the lowest-quality foodsfor example, grains like corn (for corn sweeteners and animal feed to make Big Macs) and wheat (refined carbohydrates. ) ) Meanwhile, the government does not subsidize far healthier items like fruits, vegetables, beans, and nuts. xii) Its a perverse situation, he says. The foods that are the worst for us have an artificially low price, and the best foods cost more. lxiii) This is worse than a free market we are creating a mirror-world here. ) governmental policies like cutting school budgets by dropping physical education programs may also prove to be a false economy. ) Theres fast food sold in school cafeterias, soft drinks and candies in school vending machines, and advertising in classrooms on take One. ) Meanwhile there are cutbacks in physical education, as if it were a luxury.What was once daily and mandatory is now infrequent and optional. ) Consider the pose that arose after the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) and Food and Agriculture Organization issued a report in 2003 recommending guidelines for eating to improve world nutrition and prevent chronic diseases. lxiv) Instead of applauding the report, the DHHS issued a 28-page, line-by-line critique and time-tested to get WHO to quash it. lxv) WHO recommended that people limit their intake of added sugars to no more than 10 percent of alories eaten, a guideline poorly received by the Sugar Association, a tra de group that has threatened to pressure sexual intercourse to challenge the United States $406 million contribution to WHO. ) By the last decade of the 20th Century, Americans had become much more adventuresome eaters. lxvi) Variety of choice is nearly unbelievable. lxvii) Ethnic cuisine, once shunned, enjoys increasing popularity and the new foods introduced via that route add greatly to the variety of food choices. ) The fashion toward eating out of the home continues to grow in 1998, 47% of the food dollar was spent away from home. xviii) However, the concern for nutrition was higher than ever and that fact probably contributed to retentiveness some meals at home. ) Todays families seem busier than ever. lxix) Rushing between work and school often leaves parents scrambling for time to prepare nutritious, good-tasting meals for their children. ) In fact, 44 percent of U. S. weekday meals are prepared in 30 minutes or less. ) As the quality of our diets has deteriorated over th e last 50 years, certain diseases have become rampant. Directly related to food, you hear a lot of spill about obesity-related problems in terms of diabetes, coronary artery disease and high blood pressure, and those happen in both men and women, lxx) Those are the general categories of ailments there are also many specific diet-related disorders. ) A mass of individuals are making less healthy food choices for better time management. ) Whether for good or bad, changes in diet and fitness have morphed the way people live. ) In the 1960s, it was still common to plant a garden or a fruit tree for food. xxi) Nowadays, this is not the case in fact it is less common to grow a garden in the U. S than it was 50 years ago. ) Even quick, pop in the microwave or oven meals have become more popular, despite the fact that the invention of the TV dinner occurred in 1944. lxxii) Between working and conflicting schedules, there are not as many home-cooked, healthy meals on the plates of childre n today. ) corpulency has reached epidemic proportions. lxxiii) In 2007 and 2008, 34 percent of Americans were obese and another 34 percent were overweight, according to the Center for Disease ascertain and Prevention. xxiv) In 1960 and 1962, only about 14 percent of Americans were obese and 31. 5 percent were overweight. lxxv) Since 1976, the number of obese children from ages 2 to 5 has nearly doubled. ) In 2011, people are looking for weight loss at a quick pace with diet pills, diet shakes, surgery and different diets such as the bread soup diet. lxxvi) There are more fad diets and methods of weight loss than ever before. IV. Are food allergies on the rise? If so, why? a) The number of kids with food allergies went up 18 percent from 1997 to 2007, according to the U. S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ) About 3 million children younger than 18 had a food or digestive allergy in 2007, the CDC said. c) A recent study in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology found that visits to the emergency room at Childrens Hospital Boston for allergic reactions more than doubled from 2001 to 2006. i) Although this is just one hospital, the findings reflect a rise in food allergies seen in national reports, said Dr. Susan Rudders, lead author and pediatric allergist-immunologist in Providence, Rhode Island. d) One theory is that the Western diet has made people more hypersensitised to developing allergies and other illnesses. i) The children in the African village live in a community that produces its own food. iii) The study authors say this is closer to how humans ate 10,000 years ago. iv) Their diet is mostly vegetarian. e) By contrast, the local diet of European children contains more sugar, animal fat and calorie-dense foods. v) The study authors posit that these factors result in less biodiversity in the organisms found inside the gut of European children. f) The decrease in richness of gut bacteria in Westerners may have something to do with the rise in allergies in industrialized countries, said Dr.Paolo Lionetti of the department of pediatrics at Meyer Children Hospital at the University of Florence. vi) Sanitation measures and vaccines in the West may have controlled infective disease, but they decreased icon to a variety of bacteria may have opened the door to these other ailments. g) Another theory is that children need to get exposed to common allergens, such as nuts and shellfish, from a much earlier age, to forfend developing allergies. vii) Some doctors have been recommending waiting until 2 or 3, but Ferdman at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles is a proponent of giving kids nuts very early. iii) This could occur through breastfeeding or an unintended exposure to highly processed foods in the Western diet that may contain hidden sources of the allergens. h) Cooking practices can also affect the development of food allergies. ix) For example, roasting a peanut enhances its allergenic potential compared to other forms of preparing peanut. x) Peanut allergy is more common in the U. S. where peanuts are roasted, as compared to China where peanuts are boiled. V. Is the fast food industry hurting our waistlines and our health? How? ) American emphasis on convenience and rapid consumption is best represented in fast foods such as hamburgers, French fries, and soft drinks, which almost all Americans have eaten. b) By the 1960s and 1970s fast foods became one of Americas strongest exports as franchises for McDonalds and Burger Kings spread through the world (Klem 443). c) The effect of fast food chains was infectious they had become accepted in American society. d) Traditional meals cooked at home and consumed at a leisurely pace gave way to quick lunches and dinners eaten on the run as other countries mimicked American cultural patterns. ) In some ways, American food developments are contradictory. f) Americans are more aware of food quality, yet are still eating unhealthy foods due to their incr easing dependence on convenience, and are also regularly eating fast foods (Heymsfield 148). i) Its hard for people to give up traditions, states nutrition expert, Kathy Johnson. g) Spurlocks total immersion in fast food was a one-subject research study, and his bodys response a warning about the way we eat now. h) Super Size Me could be a credo for the United States, where people, like their automobiles, have become gargantuan. i) SUVs, big homes, penis enlargement, breast enlargement, bulking up with steroidsits a context of everything getting bigger, says K. Dun Gifford 60, LL. B. 66, president of the Oldways preservation and Exchange Trust, a nonprofit organization specializing in food, diet, and nutrition education. i) Steven Gortmaker, professor of society, human development, and health at the School of Public Health, observes that the convenience-food culture is so ubiquitous that even conscientious parents have trouble steering their children away from junk food. ii) You let your kids go on a play date, says the draw of two, and they come home and say, We went to Burger King for lunch. j) He notes that on any prone day, 30 percent of American children aged four to 19 eat fast food, and older and wealthier ones eat even more. k) Overall, 7 percent of the U. S. population visits McDonalds each day, and 20 to 25 percent eat in some kind of fast-food restaurant. v) But taking the family to McDonalds for, say, Chicken McNuggets, French fries, and a sugar-sweetened beveragea meal loaded with calories, salt, trans fats (the most unhealthy, artery-clogging fats of all, typified in partially hydrogenated oils), fried foods, starch, and sugarmakes Gortmaker shake his head. I cant imagine a worse meal for kids, he says. They call this a Happy Meal? l) Humans can eat convenient, refined, highly processed food with great speed, enabling them to consume an astonishing caloric loadliterally thousands of caloriesin minutes. ) Gortmaker, Ludwig, and colleagues did research comparing caloric intake on days when children ate in a fast-food restaurant to days when they did not they soaked up 126 calories more on fast-food days, which could translate into a weight gain of 13 pounds per year on fast food alone. m) Pumping up portion size makes good business sense, because the cost of ingredients like sugar and water for a carbonated soda is trivial, and customers perceive the larger amount as delivering greater value. vi) When you have calories that are incredibly cheap, in a culture where bigger is better, thats a dangerous combination, says Walter Willett. ) Furthermore, Portion sizes have increased dramatically since the 1950s, says Beatrice Lorge Rogers 68, professor of economics and food policy at Tufts Universitys Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy. vii) For proof, consider a 1950s advertising jingle Pepsi-Cola hits the spot/12 full ounces, thats a lot. Well, its not a lot any more. o) For decades, 12 ounces (itself a move up f rom earlier 6. 5- and 10-ounce bottles) was the standard serving size for soft drinks. viii) But since the 1970s, soft drink bottles have grown to 20 and 24 ounces today, even one-liter (33. 8 ounce) bottles are marketed as single servings. ix) It doesnt point there. The 7-11 convenience store chain offers a Double Gulp cupful filled with 64 ounces of ice and soda a half-gallon serving. Surely, the 128-ounce Gallon drink is on the horizon. p) Soft drinks are becoming Americas ducky breakfast beverage, and specialty sandwiches and burritos for breakfast are fast-growing items, part of the trend toward eating out for all meals. q) The restaurant industrywhich employs 12 million workers (second only to government) and has projected sales of $440. 1 billion this year, according to its national associationranks among the nations largest businesses. ) Today, Americans spend 49 cents of every food dollar on food eaten outside the home, where, according to Rogers, they consume 30 perce nt of their calories. x) That includes take-out food (which some parts of the restaurant industry now style as home meal replacement). s) In some ways, you can see obesity as the tip of the iceberg, sitting on top of huge societal issues, says Willett. xi) There are enormous pressures on homes with both the husband and wife in the work force. t) One reason things need to be fast is that Mom is not at home preparing meals and waiting for the kids to come home from school any more. ii) She is out there in the office all day, commuting home, and maybe working extra hours at night. xiii) This means heating something in the microwave or strike the drive-through at McDonalds. u) There really is a time issuepeople do have less time. v) Technology may have secure that passivity, while making food preparation easier and faster. w) Three Harvard economists, professors of economics Edward Glaeser and David Cutler, and calibrate student Jesse Shapiro, argued in a recent paper that improved t echnology has cut the time needed to prepare food, allowing us to eat more conveniently. iv) For example, in 1978, they note, only 8 percent of homes had microwave ovens, but 83 percent do today. Food that once took hours to prepare is now nuked in minutes. x) Technology can also change what we eat. xv) Potatoes used to be baked, boiled, or mashed the labor involved in peeling, cutting, and cooking French fries meant that few home cooks served them, the economists point out. xvi) But now factories prepare potatoes for frying and ship them to fast-food outlets or freeze them for microwave cooking at home. ) Americans ate 30 percent more potatoes between 1977 and 1995, most of that increase coming in the form of French fries and potato chips. z) In general, technology has enabled the food industry to do more of the work of preparing and cooking what we eat, increasing the proportion of processed victuals in the nations diet. xvii) Frequently, processing also folds in more ingredients russet potatoes, for example, contain no added salt or oil, though most potato chips do. ) Within our laissez-faire system of food supply, the food vendors actions arent illegal, or even inherently immoral. viii) The food industrys major objective is to get us to intake more food, says Gortmaker. xix) And the TV industrys objective is to get us to watch more television, to be sedentary. ) Advertising is the action that keeps them both successful. xx) So youve got two huge industries being successful at what they are supposed to do creating more intake and less activity. xxi) And since larger people require more food energy just to sustain themselves, the food industry is growing a larger market for itself. ) That industry spends billions of dollars on research, says Willett. xii) They have guardedly researched the exact levels of sweetness and saltiness that will make every food as attractive as possible, he explains. xxiii) Each company is place out its bait, trying to make it m ore attractive than its competitors. ) Food industry science is getting better, more refined, and more powerful as we go along. xxiv) They do good sciencethey dont throw their money down the drain. ) What we spend on nutrition education is only in the tens of millions of dollars annually. xxv) Theres a huge imbalance, and it tips more and more in favor of the food industry every year. Food executives like to say, right educate the consumerwhen they create the demand for healthier food, well supply it xxvi) Thats a bit disingenuous when you consider that they are already spending billions to educate consumers. ) The food industry itself has begun to make certain investments in the direction of healthier eating. xxvii) In the future, I see a convergence between food and health, says Goldberg. xxviii) The food industry has been warned of the backlash that could hit them, like it did tobacco. ) He suggests that the food industry will become more responsive to consumers health concern s regarding issues like bioengineered ingredients in foodstuffs. ) People want a diversity of sources for their food, and traceability of sources, he says. ) The turf out code will become a vehicle not just for pricing, but for describing and listing ingredients. ) Even fast-food chains are changing in the past year, they reported a 16 percent growth in servings of main-dish salads. ) Willet sees no reason why healthy eating should not be as delicious and attractive as junk food, and the franchisers may be headed that way as well. xix) McDonalds is currently testing an adult meal that includes a pedometer and Step With It booklet along with any admission charge salad. In its kids meals, Wendys is trying out fruit cups with melon slices alternatively of French fries. xxx) Yogurt manufacturer Stonyfield Farm has launched a chain of flatus-relieving fast-food restaurants called O subjectives. ) Doritos themselves are getting healthier. xxxi) Fitness expert Kenneth cooper, M. P. H. 62, founder of the barrel maker Aerobics Center in Dallas, has been working with PepsiCos CEO, Steven S. Reinemund, to develop new products and modify existing items in a healthier direction. The companys Frito-Lay unit last year eliminated trans fats from its salty offerings. xxxii) Frito-Lay introduced organic, healthier versions of Doritos and Cheetos under the Natural sub-brand. xxxiii) As a result, 55 million pounds of trans fats will be removed(p) from the American diet over the next 12 months, Cooper says. ) PepsiCo is in 150 countries, and many of their healthier products will soon be promoted end-to-end the world. ) Physical fitness is good business for the individual and for the corporation. ) PepsiCo sells plenty of food and beverages from vending machines, many of them in schools. xxiv) You dont resolve the obesity problem in children by taking the vending machines out of schools, Cooper declares. Kids will still get what they want. xxxv) Put better products in the machines and get physical education back in the schools. ) Accordingly, PepsiCo is stocking some school machines with fruit juices from its Tropicana and Dole brands, Gatorade, and Aquafina bottled water others offer Frito-Lay products that meet Coopers consort I standard no trans fats and restricted amounts of calories, fat, saturated fat, and sodium. Fast food has become a staple for many individuals. xxxvi) Though fast food was developed in the 1930s, it has peaked in popularity during the past two decades. ) According to CBS HealthWatch, at least a quarter of all Americans eat at McDonalds once per day. 1) How have your own dietary practices changed over the years? 2) How have your dietary practices changed since taking a course in nutrition?