Vocal Voices

Experts now say that we should eat at least 7 portions of fruit and veg in order to be healthier and live longer.

I thought that it was an April Fool's when I read these comments:

"The clear message here is that the more fruit and vegetables you eat, the less likely you are to die - at any age."

The study looked at general mortality as well as death from cancer, heart disease and stroke, and found risk of premature death from any cause decreased as fruit and veg consumption increased.

Risk of death by any cause over the course of the study was reduced by:

14% by eating one to three portions of fruit or veg per day
29% for three to five
36% for five to seven
42% for seven or more (up to around 10 portions a day)

however, they really mean it.There are many reasons given, but a few important ones are missing.

Due to the intensification and industrialisation of farming since WWII the nutritional value of our food has dropped. Globally we are growing more and more (numbers and volume) but this has more to do with creating strains with bigger yields in a shorter time, and the use of artificial fertilisers. The crops are not taking up the essential minerals and elements from the soil - they are bulked out like an athlete on steroids.

This has not only affected fruit and veg. Livestock is now almost exclusively fed on bulked out 'animal feed' rather than the free food in the fields. The levels of iron and other minerals in meat has also dropped.

We are probably having to eat more of the stuff they sell to us because it is about as nutritious as the packaging it comes in. No wonder diet supplements are all the rage.

We were both shouting at the silly woman on Brekkie this mrning

A couple of weeks ago they were saying that sugar including fruit was the devil incarnate! Eating 7 pieces of fruit would take your sugar levels way up, calories too if they were bananas

We were telling that woman she was daft too

As Grumpy said, they want us all to be vegetarians - fat chance of that over here, the Portuguese don't "do" veggie stuff

Well, lessee now.
5 portions of fruit and veg = 400 grams.
So if we eat the recommended 7 portions, that's 560 grams of fruit and veg every day. In old money thats just over 1lb 5oz!
Gordon Bennett!
And this morning the lastest mournful maunjy news is that were all going to die of air pollution.
I tell you what, if each and one of us is eating 1lb 5oz of cabbage and broccoli every day, the levels of methane in the atmosphere will rocket! They'll have some need to complain about air quality then!
Birds will be falling unconcious from the skies...!

I should really bookmark things.....

When the debate was raging about the sugar tax I read that the British were never fitter than during the War and immediately afterwards, when food was rationed. It was interesting that all the "nice" stuff such as butter, meat, bacon, jam, biscuits, and so on, were rationed, but we could have as much fruit and veg as we could lay our hands on.

I am not old enough to have been affected by rationing, except that when I was young the principles of making the most out of very little still applied, and I survived!

All those GM crops and veg. "Eat them !! They are good for you"