Are we doing enough to promote healthy eating?

Better Science, Better Food and Better Lifestyle was the eye- catching theme of a recent seminar organised by the Nutrition and Health Foundation, the Irish Business and Employers Confederation (Ibec) offshoot promoting health and wellbeing. While the promotion of better food in catering and better lifestyle through more physical activity were broadly covered, it is questionable whether better science was a true aim of the day.

The keynote speaker, Swiss physiologist Prof Luc Tappy, presented what most attendees found to be a confusing summary of the role of fructose (which is sugar that occurs naturally, mainly in fruit, as opposed to sucrose, which is added white sugar) in overeating, insulin resistance (type 2 diabetes) and the build-up of fat in the body.

Tappy’s main point seemed to be that we shouldn’t be demonising sugar, because it is just one of many causes of obesity.

“A lot of people say sugar is the main factor in obesity, but it’s not the sole factor. Twenty years ago, it was saturated fats, and sugar was supposed to be good,” he told the audience of food industry representatives, researchers and health-promotion organisations.

Food industry’s defence

You can’t help thinking that this is the food industry’s defence for continuing to have high levels of sugar in many of their products. When questioned after his presentation, Tappy said: “The metabolism of sugar doesn’t make you fat, it’s the fact that it makes you eat more than you need [that makes you fat]. Some people overeat sweet foods, some people overeat fatty foods.”

He did, however, admit that the relationship between dental cavities and sugar intake is the reason to support the World Health Organisation’s (WHO’s) recommendation that sugar intake is limited to 5 per cent of total calories, the most recent target set by the WHO.

While craving more accessible information (for example, sugar in whole fruit is less damaging to teeth because it’s released as sugar only when it is blended in juices or smoothies), this writer pondered what would have been a more worthwhile presentation. For example, a food scientist could talk through the industry’s efforts to improve the quality of ingredients used in food manufacturing.

That said, other speakers at the seminar seemed to be faring better in their efforts to clean up our diets. Derek Reilly, the executive head chef with Sodexo Ireland, spoke about how the catering industry is introducing more healthy choices to menus in workplace and school canteens across the country.

“We feed 90,000 people a day and we’ve been moving towards healthier cooking methods such as baking chips, steaming vegetables, putting sauce on the side, not adding cream to soup, and flavouring foods with fresh herbs and lemon or lime juice, instead of butter and salt.”

The catering company has also introduced calorie labelling in 60 per cent of its sites. “It’s about offering choices such as wholegrain bread, dried fruit instead of whole fruits and ‘breadless’ sandwiches,” said Reilly.

‘Report card’ on physical activity

Deirdre Harrington, a researcher from the Diabetes Research Centre at the University of Leicester in England, spoke about the development of an international “report card” on physical activity which can measure a country’s physical activity levels across a range of measures. These include sports participation, active play, mode of transport to work or school, and so on.

“We found that only 25 per cent of children in Ireland were meeting the physical activity levels. There were some indicators we couldn’t measure; for example, we don’t have data on active play in Ireland,” said Harrington, who is part of an international research team developing this comparative physical activity report card.

Harrington stressed how regular physical activity had many benefits in childhood such as improved mental health, academic performance, weight control and social interaction. “Active children are also more likely to choose other healthy behaviours and, significantly, teenagers who are inactive are four times more likely to be inactive as adults. We will repeat the process in 2016 to see how Ireland is faring then.

“Meanwhile, we need a multisector approach to support physical activity and improve our surveillance of it,” she added. She is seeking funding for the project to continue.