Day 269 - 25 Jun 96 - Page 13
1
2 Q. No, I meant if they were not eating at McDonald's. Say,
3 for example, they ate at McDonald's for a ten-year period
4 once a week or --
5 A. As I said, you know, it is very difficult to give a
6 hard and fast figure on this topic without spending a very
7 large amount of money and several years research
8 investigating the relative risk factors of eating at
9 McDonald's or Kentucky Fried Chicken or, for that matter,
10 choosing your food in Safeways. I think that you would
11 have to have a major long-term research initiative with
12 very substantial funding to answer this question with any
13 real degree of precision. All I am trying to do is to give
14 a vague guide as to what, and it can be no more and not
15 intended to be any more than that, as to where one might be
16 in a ballpark figure.
17
18 Q. Yes?
19 A. Now, if you are asking if people do not eat at
20 McDonald's --
21
22 Q. That was not what I asked, sorry. If I can just explain.
23 I am not asking you to give a figure in terms of how many
24 people would be affected, which was the calculations that
25 you were doing here. You have taken a specific example of
26 somebody eating there once a week for, you know, a large
27 part of their lives?
28 A. Yes.
29
30 Q. In order to get these figures. But all I am saying is not
31 going into what percentage contribution they might have or
32 whatever, if somebody ate at McDonald's once a week for,
33 you know, ten years or some other similar figure, would you
34 still consider that as having some kind of an impact on
35 their diet and therefore influence on their --
36 A. Well, there are the two answers to your question. The
37 first is this; that the evidence from smoking and heart
38 disease has, without doubt, shown that if you stop smoking
39 you reduce your risk. So I think that is really coming
40 clearly through all the recommendations that have been made
41 with regard to smoking and heart disease in particular.
42 And I would suggest that that is precisely the same
43 situation so far as heart disease is concerned and diet.
44
45 During the war there was a most interesting fall in
46 mortality from heart disease, despite the alleged stress
47 under which the British population was supposed to be under
48 as a consequence of the war. But heart disease fell
49 dramatically during the war and rose again shortly
50 afterwards.
51
52 Now, the other evidence, or the other argument I would put
53 to you is this; that if an individual was eating at
54 McDonald's regularly, at this source, a case I put further
55 down which I think is being made probably by McDonald's
56 themselves, the likelihood is that they have a kind of
57 perception about the food that they choose to eat or want
58 to eat and the degree to which that perception has actually
59 been insinuated and persuaded by the techniques of the
60 fast-food people, who are naturally wanting to encourage
