The good news is that Theresa May has dropped the threat to withdraw universal free school meals. Thank God (and the PM) for that. School lunches are the biggest weapon we have to fight obesity.
The UK is sixth in the supersize race of OECD countries, with a quarter of the population obese. The fact that six of the fattest nations (the US, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Ireland and the UK) are English-speaking should tell us something about our food culture. But sadly even Japan and South Korea, the slimmest nations, are fattening up fast on burgers and chips.
What is to be done? No country is going to have the courage to ban junk food, as they have drugs. Maybe we’ll come to that one day. We all know the NHS spends billions on diet-related illnesses, but did you know the fastest-growing surgical procedure in British hospitals is amputations, of which about half are due to diabetes? Can we afford the luxury of obesity? Seriously overweight people are generally less productive and consequently contribute less to the taxman.
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