Day 269 - 25 Jun 96 - Page 16
1
2 Q. "I consider it unlikely that people persuaded to eat
3 regularly at McDonald's would be uninfluenced. They are
4 most likely to believe what they are told, namely that such
5 meals are nutritious and eat in a similar style at home.
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7 There is no doubting the fact that death from heart disease
8 rose strikingly from 1950 to the late 1980's in parallel
9 with a rise in the amount of dietary saturated fat and
10 associated trans-isomers. It is also true that in the UK
11 the bulk of that rise was due largely to a rise in animal
12 fat intake and trans-isomers from hydrogenated or hardened
13 vegetable and marine oils.
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15 McDonald's is proud of its market leadership and has a Web
16 site on the Internet proclaiming that 28 million people eat
17 each day worldwide at its outlets and that it is now in 80
18 countries. In the USA 49% of McDonald's users are 'heavy'
19 (1-3 times a week) and 23% are 'super heavy', i.e. 4 plus
20 times a week. Such a diet is clearly of serious concern.
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22 What happens in America generally happens in the UK some
23 ten years later. This American experience with such a high
24 proportion of heavy users, gives some ideas of knock-on
25 effect and future trends in the UK. The context of
26 McDonald's in this respect is simply that it is, in its own
27 admission, and in its own practice of increasing its market
28 encroachment, one of the most powerful forces winning
29 people over to eating this type of food. The conclusion is
30 that the figures given above for estimated influence on
31 heart disease in the UK, are likely to be an under estimate
32 in view of the knock-on effect on food choice at home and
33 in vulnerable groups.
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35 2.2.2 A major reason for the focus on dietary fats:
36 I refer to my previous evidence in which I illustrated the
37 contrast of wild and domestic carcass fat and protein
38 production. The carcass of the modern intensively reared
39 beef animal yields 45 units of dietary energy from protein
40 and 225 units from fat. In the wild antecedent to our
41 beef, the carcass yields 60 units of protein and nutrients
42 compared to 36 units from fat. The fat in both cases is
43 largely saturated fat.
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45 Human physiology was adapted over several million years to
46 the lower saturated fat intake. In the few generations
47 during which this rise in animal fat has taken place there
48 is no way that humans could have adapted through any
49 Darwinian process of selection to this type of food. This
50 point is made again to explain the enormity of the change
51 from our physiological and genetic heritage and why there
52 is so much concern amongst scientists and indeed, why so
53 much evidence has come forward with such consistency on
54 heart disease and the amount of saturated fat eaten today.
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56 2.2.3. McDonald's as a nutritious meal:
57 I agree that in itself McDonald's meal does provide
58 important nutrients. However, those same nutrients can be
59 obtained in other ways without the saturated fat load. I
60 append a table showing how a McDonald's meal compares in
