Boris’s misguided war on obesity

Boris Johnson has declared the government’s latest war on obesity. It’s a continuation of the war on ‘junk food’. It’s a timely move, as in lockdown we’ve all been snacking and munching straight from the fridge, during the most ghastly yet boring year in known living memory.

Most of us have got fatter as a consequence. Predictably, we are once more now reprimanded for eating ‘junk food’. Yet it’s also an occasion to remind ourselves that there is no such thing as ‘junk food’. There’s only ‘junk diet’.

The idea of ‘junk food’ has been around for a couple of decades now as the proliferation of fast food outlets has expanded exponentially, with those ghastly names such as ‘McDonald’s’ and ‘Burger King’, offering cheap food for the terrible proletariat.

The waistlines of Europeans and Americans have expanded at an alarming rate as a consequence, so goes the narrative. During lockdown, matters have got even worse.