[YIneeta]

Food Addiction?

People may become addicted to food because they are experiencing withdrawal symptoms or due to some key ingredient, for example, sugar. Food create a cascade of effects before it enters our mouth and once it enters our body it does a lot, due to this we are automatically programmed to keep eating the food we like in excess.

Genetically Modified foods?

Food undergoes many modifications that change the chemical properties, this affects what we may consider food. Also some of the modifications might create some effects due to the body not adapting to the changes.

Socio-economical Status?

What we believe tastes good is socially constructed or it is defined as part of a culture, we are trained to believe what tastes good and what does not. Might have been taught to us by our parents what we should eat and how much. Before people used to farm and was much closer to food but now due to economical developments food has to be shipped from distances and people become more distant from food. They turn to unhealthy food because it is more affordable for them and is easily available.

Psychological factors?

Food is being associated with feelings, example when we are stressed some of us tend to eat more. We like certain foods because of positive associations based on family. Due to suburban developments food has to be shipped from distances and it creates a psychological distance between people and food, they become less concerned as to where the food is coming from. We have to look at factors like what promotes health? People have been trained to eat a fourth meal out of normal eating time, this may have been influenced by marketing.

What represents the most serious health risk outside of US?

Overnutrition and Obesity

What’s the main problem with too many ingredients?

With evolution we have adapted to eating certain foods with certain ingredients and this adaptation took many years. Now we have a problem because we have added so many ingredients very rapidly that our body has not adapted to them and it becomes harmful.

Why would you like ice cream better than cauliflower?

The Professor examined that cauliflower has nutrients and a haagen daz cream gives you energy. It was discussed that our body is biologically programmed to defend itself against famine and starvation, humans and animals fought these over the years, this is why we seek out the ice cream first because it inherently tastes better and gives us energy.

Should taxation influence the quality of food we eat?

This is a very valid point, if we raise the tax for food people should not eat and lower it for the ones people should eat, this might create such an effect where people will choose the healthier food due to it now being more affordable.

[Ma]

I think that nowadays our society is need to study how to control any addiction. Its very important subject in the world. As we studied in biology that our brain receives and sends impulse to our body what to do or what not to do. By that I mean : Hypothalamus,posterior pituitary …. Any addiction can create health problem. For instance ,sugar,alcohol ,cigarets,etc …. But the biggest mistake is that we don’t let our mind to think and just let our wishes to have more power than our thinking. We need to study physiology,psychology more deep worldwide.
Most Americans believe that fat in their diet is the biggest problem. However, sugar plays a huge role in obesity and health problem. Sugar is not only cheap, but it is also deadly. This entire problem emerged not too long ago. Food prices were going up and down. In 1973, Richard Nixon did not want to lose his presidential election. Nixon admonished USDA Secretary Earl Bultz to take food off the political table. Nixon wanted to make food cheap. In 1975, high fructose corn syrup was introduced to American market. Sugar was changed to sweeteners and price went down immediately. Now, sweeteners are in almost all food and drinks.
Fructose metabolizes only in the liver. It does not suppress the hunger hormone. It makes our brain think its starving. So, we keep eating and gain weight. Over 50 years the number of sugar consumers has tripled worldwide. Over 30% of people are more obese than they were before. Sugar has been added to almost all food and left no choice for consumers. Our ancestors had sugar a few times a year. They could enjoy “sweet” only in a harvest time, in a honey, because it was difficult to find. Nowadays, getting man made sugar is easy, while nature made it hard. In the journal “Nature”, author Robert Lusting says “A little is not a problem, but a lot kills — slowly” .He means that people cannot regulate food if poison is everywhere. “Authorities consider sugar as ’empty calories’ — but there is nothing empty about these calories. A growing body of scientific evidence is showing that fructose can trigger processes that lead to liver toxicity and a host of other chronic diseases”. In other words, Lusting argues that poisoning the liver can cause problems to different organs and cause diseases including coronary, heart disease and Type II diabetes.
Cardiovascular disease and diabetes were the number one problem in America in 1970. Unfortunately, doctor’s recommendation of a low fat diet resulted in an enormous increase in metabolic syndrome, obesity, Type II diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease. Over the last 30 years our foods have been contaminated with an increase of fructose, removal of fiber, substitution of trans-fat. For example, people used to consume one hundred to three hundred grams fiber per day. Now, we consume only twelve grams per day. The government did all this because it is easy to freeze food and ship it around the world. Food industry propaganda was made just to sell their items. They also changed butter to margarine. They made us believes that Canola oil is the most profitable oil.
The government controlled tobacco and alcohol to fragment public health. However, they did not want to regulate food, because it was more complicated. Medical researchers said that sugar had the same toxic effect to liver as alcohol, because alcohol was derived from the fermentation of sugar. “About 25% of military applicants are now rejected for obesity-related reasons; the past three US surgeons general and the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff have declared obesity a threat to national security” . Today is very difficult regulate sugar by the government, because “Sugar is cheap, sugar tastes good and sugar sells, so companies have little incentive to change.”American politicians are battling for our public health and well being. They say that it is time to turn our attention to sugar. I agree with them and totally support their opinions. I think the faster the government comes to the conclusion that sugar is poison, the faster people will get healthier.

[Kea]

Hello, my name is Karina.

I am a little confused. Are we supposed to post discussion on here or on blackboard? I posted it on BB…