Don’t blame it on the junk, get moving!

By 21. August 2014Blog, Health, Nutrition

Obesity is a growing problem in the UK and one which is quite often put on the shoulders of bad diet, but a new briefing paper published by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) says it is the lack of exercise not bad diet that is to blame.

Apparently some campaigners against excess sugar in food have even been dismissing the link between lack of physical activity and obesity. But not the author of this report. He has found that “consumption of calories – and of sugar and fat – has fallen significantly while obesity rates have risen”.

The report goes on to detail the decrease in calorie consumption and states, assuming that there hasn’t been a change in the laws of thermodynamics, he can only come to one conclusion: “Britons are, on average, burning fewer calories than we used to.”

The report makes for an interesting read, and I’ll leave you with the beginning to the conclusion section “Any attempt to pin the blame on specific ingredients, such as sugar and saturated fat, is hindered by the inconvenient truth that consumption of these nutrient has also declined.”

The report “The Fat Lie” is available from the IEA website.

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