Over the weekend I took advantage of having some free time and browsed through Netflix to see what was new. On my ‘recommended viewing’ list I spotted the documentary Fed Up and I was hooked by the tag line ‘The film the food industry didn’t want you to see’. I hadn’t heard of the documentary nor was I aware of the controversy it had caused but I’m glad that I watched.
I was brought up to believe that all calories are equal and if you ate too many then you burnt them off through exercise. I literally thought that if you spent half of your daily allowance on chocolate then you wouldn’t gain weight; why would you if you are within your allotted calories? WRONG! Apparently if you eat high sugar dishes or drink full sugar soda then your body can’t process such a sugar rush in a healthy way and it converts this sugar rush straight to fat, generally in the stomach area. When you eat sugar in the form of a piece of fruit the body is able to process this in a different way due to the amount of fibre accompanying the sugar. The process is slower and doesn’t have the same ‘straight to fat’ side effect. Throughout the documentaries there were warnings about the amount of hidden sugar in processed foods and the huge amounts of unhealthy foods fed to children in US school cafeterias. I was shocked at the evidence to show that public health issues are being hidden by the food industry and concerned to see just how conniving they can be.
At the end of the documentary I realised how lucky we are in the UK to have people like Jamie Oliver who have challenged the food industry and the positive impact this has had on school meals in Britain. I have now banned my kids from having full sugar soda and encouraged them to look at what they eat; luckily they have always had packed lunches so I can make sure they get a healthy balanced diet.
Fed Up isn’t ‘just another documentary’. It is controversial but everything that is said is backed up with evidence. I’m pretty sure Bill Clinton would not be appearing as part of any programme that made false allegations and I think as parents we need to be careful about what we are really feeding our kids.
ohanameans 