Calories Fest

Another interesting follow up to the previous story published on the obesity epidemic currently plaguing the world. This story is another follow up on issues being raised and studies being presented at the European Congress on Obesity. The study shows that Calories are one of the main reasons behind this epidemic as many US foods such as Big Macs and Coca-Cola are consumed too much by obese people. The journalist uses these facts to provide a strong message that people need to change dieting habits to fight obesity and that exercise does not do everything. This article was published in The Australian (sourced from wire services in this case The Times an English Newspaper) and around the world many media outlets focused on this particular issue. Hopefully it helps raise awareness on the issue of obesity.

The Calories Fest

Calories culprit in bigger picture

The Times

Sam Lister | May 11, 2009

OVEREATING rather than more sedentary living is almost entirely to blame for the rise in obesity in the developed world, according to research.

A study of the US obesity “epidemic” – a precursor of world dietary trends – suggests there has not been any significant reduction in levels of exercise in the past 30 years. It concludes that the surge in obesity is a result of excessive calories.

Researchers at the World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre for Obesity Prevention, at Deakin University in Victoria, said the findings would be reflected in other industrialised countries. WHO estimates that in 2005, about 1.6billion adults worldwide were overweight, of whom at least 400 million were obese.

Health professionals and campaigners welcomed the latest findings, presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Amsterdam, as evidence of the need to focus on diet and the availability and over-promotion of highly calorific foods.

For the WHO-Deakin study, researchers calculated what Americans should weigh today based on their current higher food intake, and compared it with their weight. If they weighed more than projected, it would suggest reduced activity.

Researchers found that adults weighed less than could be expected from their diet, suggesting that, if anything, they had increased their physical activity over time.

Among children, the tests showed a 100 per cent match, leading researchers to conclude that changes in physical activity had had no effect on children in the US growing fatter.
Boyd Swinburn, chairman of population health at Deakin University, said the findings would be similar for other developed countries.

“This is a call to focus public health attention more on the energy intake side,” Professor Swinburn said.

He said American children had grown on average 4kg heavier and adults 7.7kg heavier. For the US population to return to leaner 1970s levels, children would have to cut their intake by about 350 calories a day – equal to a can of fizzy drink and a portion of fries, and adults by about 500 calories – about the same as a Big Mac. Alternatively, children would have to walk an extra 2 1/2 hours a day, and adults nearly two hours.

“Getting everybody to walk an extra two hours a day is not really a feasible option for countering the epidemic,” Professor Swinburn said. “We need to limit our expectations of what an increase in physical activity can achieve.”

Bad News for Young Obese

In a light hearted look at health news in this story, a study has found that young obese adults had less than a 50% chance of marrying by their 30’s and 40’s. This study conducted between 1951 and 1961 looked at 500,000 Swedish men and these findings were presented at a health conference in Amsterdam yesterday. This International story was picked up on the wires in Australia and was published in the Agence France-Presse. The story was also looked at by many international news outlets such as CNN and the UK Daily Telegraph and was seen as mid range news filler. These facts could help young obese adults to start excersing and look at their weight issues

Obese young men have less hope of marriage: study

Agence France-Presse

A worrying statistic

MEN who were grossly overweight at the age of 18 had nearly 50 per cent less chance of being married by their 30s and 40s, an international conference on obesity has heard in Amsterdam.
The findings, which held true regardless of the men’s intellectual performance or socio-economic position, could suggest that women rank a man’s appearance higher than other traits when choosing a partner.
“Yes, that may be one explanation,” researcher Malin Kark of the Swedish Karolinska Institutet medical university, said at the four-day gathering hosted by the European Association for the Study of Obesity.
Mr Kark’s study was conducted among more than 500,000 Swedish men born between 1951 and 1961.
It found that men who had been obese at 18 were 46 per cent less likely to be married in 1991, when they were aged between 30 and 40, than men with no weight problem, and 45 per cent less likely by 2004.
For men who were overweight but not obese at 18, the chances of marriage were somewhat higher – 10 per cent lower than for men of normal weight in their 30s and 9 per cent lower in their forties”We think this shows that there is stigmatisation of obese young men that continues into adulthood – in their working life and also in inter-personal relationships,” said Mr Kark.
While no information was available on the men’s adult weight, other studies have found that obese adolescents were likely to become obese adults, she added.
Obesity for the purposes of the study was qualified as a person with a body mass index (the weight in kilograms divided by the square of the height in metres) of more than 30.
The World Health Organisation estimates that in 2005, about 1.6 billion adults were overweight, of which at least 400 million were obese.

Celebreties and their Weighty Issues

Celebrities, the obsession with them can be at times be over the top and many people try to look like these larger then life figures. At times people will go to desperate lengths to have the perfect body and infact copy celebrities. An interesting story I picked up on was from CNN.com following on from a piece shown on Larry King live. Larry King is joined by former model Kathy Ireland and Bob Greene to talk about concern over weight gain and health issues. This story comes back on the fact of actress Kristie Alley saying she was embarrassed by her weight gain.

Former model: Fret over being fit, not how you look

(CNN) — Celebrities and their bodies. We’re obsessed. They’re obsessed. And it spills over to how many people feel about themselves. But how much concern over weight gain is about vanity and how much is about critical health issues?

n Monday’s “Larry King Live,” Kathy Ireland and Bob Greene joined Larry to talk about the subject, prompted by Kirstie Alley’s well-publicized battle with weight.

Ireland is a former supermodel and actress and has had her own weight issues. Greene is Oprah Winfrey’s personal trainer.

The interview picks up here after King plays a clip from Alley’s appearance on the show last week. In the clip, Alley says her weight gain was “humiliating. I think the biggest, most painful thing for me is I have all these people I inspired and then I let them down.”

Larry King: Are we overly involved with this topic, Kathy?

Kathy Ireland: Well, I think we are for the wrong reasons. And I think there is such an obsession with appearance. With my weight gain, people wanted to know, well, when is she going to squeeze back into a bikini? No. That is not what it’s about. But what people weren’t asking me, what’s the triglyceride level? What is the C reactive protein?

King: We’re not just talking aesthetics?

Bob Greene: No, we’re not. We run into problems any time we think weight is the problem. Weight is a symptom of something that needs to change in your life.

King: Kathy, you [were an] internationally famous swimsuit model, and then you gained weight, right?

Ireland: The weight gain was gradual, about a pound a year for the past 25 years. I intentionally built a business that has absolutely nothing to do with my appearance.

So I would think what does it matter? My food choices. Well, what matters is what am I doing to my health? And I encourage people — you know, please don’t put it off. Every mom I know has a to-do list. Put yourself on that to-do list. Call your doctor tomorrow. Get an appointment. Find out what is the health of your heart.

King: Is fluctuating weight like Kirstie Alley bad, Bob?

Greene: Well, there’s two sides to that story. First off, if you remain heavy, that’s when the most damage is done to your heart and the excessive health ramifications from keeping overweight. So as long as you’re watching, even if it’s yo-yo dieting, that’s healthier than the person that remains heavy.

However, the best thing is to live the lifestyle of moving more and eating less and pursuing what it is that got you there in the first place.

King: By the way, Bob’s posted an exclusive commentary for our blog. Read Bob Greene’s blog on CNN.

Let’s take another look at a clip of Kirstie Alley talking with Oprah about her weight struggles.

[video clip begins] Alley: And then when I gained weight the last time and lost it, I honest to God thought, this is it. This will be the last time I ever do this again.

Winfrey: Yes. And now you know differently. But you knew because you had all that exercise equipment in your house, remember? We went to your house, and there was all the exercise equipment in the living room.

Alley: And I moved it out and made it a dining room. [video clip ends]

King: That’s Kirstie sort of making fun of this, don’t you think?

Ireland: I appreciate her honesty and her openness.

And Oprah, she has let us know that there’s no shame in a weight gain. With the picture that our son took of me, I was tempted to push the delete button. But, you know, beautiful people come in all shapes and sizes, ages and colors. But we’ve got to get the message out about health. What kind of message is that sending to our children?

King: Kathy, are we getting better?

Ireland: I hope we’re getting better. I pray we’re getting better. We’ve got to teach our children. We’ve got to get the message out there for women, don’t beat yourself up. But please be healthy. Don’t put off your health. It’s too important.

King: Do you notice more interest?

Greene: I see more interest in the foods we eat, but I see less interest in moving more, which is at least one-third of the problem, and even less interest in resolving the things in our life that drive us to the refrigerator.

King: This is not purely American, is it? Or is it?

Greene: No, it’s starting to shift over into Australia, New Zealand, overseas. So it’s not uniquely American.

Can i get some sugar?

This article comes from English Newspaper the Guardian, a well respected national newspaper. This feature article looks at the way in which major cooparations are promoting these unhealthy foods as being healthy for their children. It shows the amount of sugar in these cerals and supposedley nutrious meals. The article shows that these companies are doing nothing to reduce sugar levels in cereals and other products. These companies include Heinz and Kellogs

Food industry breaks healthy eating promises

A report published today shows just how little the food industry has done to make products marketed at children more healthy. Are we surprised?

But don’t worry. Kellogg’s is taking steps, “because nothing’s more important in life than your health and wellbeing”. The website boasts: “We’ve teamed up with the Government’s Change4Life initiative to promote a balance of eating well, being more active and therefore living longer.” Still not surprised? Nor me.

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A toddler eating crisps. Photograph: Zena Holloway/Corbis

A quick quiz for mummies and daddies. Which of these pairs of snacks are better for your little darling?

1. A bite of MacDonald’s quarter-pounder with cheese? Or a Farley’s Toddler’s Own Mini-Cheese Biscuit?

2. A dark chocolate digestive? Or a Farley’s Original rusk?

3. A bite of Cadbury’s Picnic bar? Or a spoonful of Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut Cornflakes?

4. A packet of Walker’s cheese and onion crisps, or the same weight in Tesco’s Special Flakes breakfast cereal?

You probably didn’t have much trouble with that. Obviously the naughty snack choices are better for a little ‘un – there’s less saturated fat, gram for gram, in the quarter-pounder, less sugar in the digestive and the Picnic bar, and much less salt in the crisps.

This all comes from new reports by Sustain’s Children’s Food Campaign and Which?. They also pointed out that Morrison’s Choco Crackles, Kellogg’s Coco Pops, Moons and Stars, Frosties and Ricicles are 37% pure sugar – indeed they contain about as much per 30g serving as a Cadbury’s chocolate Flake.

OK, so you’re not surprised. It does boggle one’s cells, though, the way these food corporations have the cheek to trumpet their commitment to children’s health. “We’re on a journey to make sure we always make good food your family can eat at every mealtime … working closely with the Food Standards Agency and Government health departments on healthy eating issues,” says Heinz, who own Farley’s. Some journey. And Heinz have a page on their site devoted to the problem of overweight six-year-olds and obese 15 year olds – where Heinz admits and profusely apologises for the role its played in Billy Bunterising the nation.

Actually Heinz doesn’t – Heinz blames the parents. We should exercise our brats more and tempt them to eat greens by adding Heinz Tomato Ketchup and Heinz Salad Cream, it says. The sad thing is, some of us will. We trust them. And then we’ll become the subjects of one of those specialist Daily Telegraph human zoo pieces, like this one, where “Britain’s fattest mother” admits to raising her eight-month-old triplets on fast food. But that now seems not to be such a bad idea.

Still not shocked by the food corporations? OK try this. A bowl of Kellogg’s Frosties – which, you may have noticed, is marketed at children, especially those who like tigers – contains 37g of sugar, about 7 teaspoons, in 100g. This is nearly half the entire recommended daily intake of sugar for a 5-10 year old (my 10-year-old Frostie-fan eats about 80g of the cereal in a sitting, when he can get them).

In 2004, after criticism from the government, Kellogg’s promised to cut the sugar content of Frosties and introduced a new “reduced sugar” version, a mere 25% sugar to the standard 37%.

But where are Reduced Sugar Frosties now? All eaten up, probably by Tony the Tiger. They went out of production last year.

Cereal Shock Horror

An alarming study was presented in an article in the Courier Mail showing that only two types of breakfast cereals are deemed suitable for kids. The by Choice showed that the cereals were bad in a nutritional sense as they contained high levels of sugar and salt. This once again looks at the debate of major corporations marketing bad foods towards young children on in a promotional sense. The journalist has done well to show parents that these cereals are actually bad for there children by using quotes to substantiate her claims. This article was used in many AAP papers.

Not all Cereals are good

All but two breakfast cereals unsuitable for kids

BREAKFAST cereals aimed at children are among the “worst” nutritional choices with only two deemed suitable, a new investigation has found.

The Choice survey of 42 kids cereals found only two – Sanitarium Weet-Bix Kids and Uncle Tobys VitaBrits Weeties – were suitable for everyday eating.

The rest should not be part of a child’s daily diet, Choice found.

“It’s an unfortunate fact that most of these cereals are among the worst for excessive sugar and salt,” the report said. “And while children don’t need as much fibre as adults, they still need more than they’d get from many of these cereals.”

According to Choice, many of the health claims about breakfast cereals were “more marketing hype than nutritional science”.

Among those cereals rated as unsuitable for daily eating was Sanitarium Skippy Corn Flakes and Nutri-Grain. Choice noted two other cereals – Kellogg’s Fruit Loops and New Day Fruity Rings – contained artificial colours linked to hyperactivity in UK research.

Sport and $$$$$$$$

An interesting local article in the Adelaide Now newspaper looks at a study conducted which shows that “sport” one of the main forms of exercise is to expensive and that parents are withdrawing their children to high costs of sports. This study is done at a perfect time when families are feeling the pinch of the Global Financial Crisis. As alarming as this study looks the journalist still shows that it isn’t all bad news by quoting Professor Tim Olds. But this issue will be continued to be looked at on how the GFC will effect exercise health.

Kids Sport a past-time

Playing sport too costly for some teenagers

MOST South Australian parents believe it is becoming harder for their teenage children to play sports because of prohibitive costs, a survey has found.

This is despite 76 per cent of teenagers saying they want to exercise and stay healthy.

The study of more than 1000 Australian parents by Fitness First showed that 58 per cent admit it’s tougher to keep teenagers healthy in this financial climate and 95 per cent say there should be more free exercise options in sponsored school sport and holiday programs.

About one in three said they spent up to $2000 on sport and sporting equipment.

Professor Tim Olds, from the School of Health Sciences at the University of South Australia, said children from wealthy families generally had access to more exercise than children from poorer families. “I would imagine that families will be cutting back even further on the amount they spend on children’s sports,” he said.

Fitness First offers teenagers two free exercise programs

What’s for Dinner?

This story looks at how the family dinner affects your your nutrional health and different aspects of your health. The article published in the Brisbane Times is a feature article looking the effects of eating family dinners.

A Family Dinner

Table time is still the answer

April 21, 2009

IT’S the ultimate image of the happy, well-adjusted family: mum, dad and the kids sitting around the dinner table together, politely passing the carrots and potatoes and discussing the day’s events.

No one talks with their mouth full, there’s no sulking or kicking each other under the table and the children leap unbidden to clear the table.

In your dreams.

As most parents know, real-world mealtimes rarely live up to this Cosby Show ideal. More typically they resemble feeding time at Taronga Zoo.

Is it any wonder a substantial proportion of parents give up on the rose-tinted ideal of the family dinner, either abandoning it altogether or succumbing to demands to keep the television on during the meal.

According to a report, 22 per cent of Australian families eat together four times or less a week and 60 per cent of all families always, or often, have the television on during meals.

While the demise of the family dinner is far from imminent, according to Dr Rebecca Huntley, author of the report Because Family Mealtimes Matter , there is still “definite room for improvement”.

“This is particularly the case for families with teenaged children, who are more likely to enjoy fewer family meals and more likely consume those meals on the couch and in front of the TV,” she says.

Psychologists, dieticians and sociologists are such passionate advocates of the family meal because of something we all instinctively know – it’s a valuable ritual that brings an enormous string of benefits.

First cab off the rank in that list is improved relationships between everyone in the family.

A 2007 study by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University in the US found a strong link between family dinners and teens’ risk of going on to abuse drugs.

“Compared to 12- and 13-year-olds who have frequent family dinners, 12- and 13-year-olds who have infrequent family dinners are six times likelier to have used marijuana, more than 4½ times likelier to have used tobacco and more than 2½ times likelier to have used alcohol,” the report says.

Then there’s the link the same study found between family dinners and academic performance. According to CASA, teenagers who have fewer than three family dinners in a typical week are more than twice as likely to do poorly in school.

There are also very obvious nutritional and health benefits.

“We know that [with] families that eat in front of the television and kids who spend a lot of time in front of computers, the proportion of junk food they eat is greater and the quality is worse,” says Dr Clare Collins, Associate Professor in nutrition and dietetics at the University of Newcastle.

“That means that biochemically you are missing out on nutrients that actually help your brain work better and produce energy in your body.”

So if sitting down together daily to break bread is such an incredibly powerful force for good, why are so many of us not doing it as well or as often as we should?

Collins is uncompromising: “People come up with all sorts of reasons why you can’t do it but I say ‘No, that is simply not good enough’,” she says. “If you value it and prioritise it there are no excuses.”

And it always helps to give the kids a job so they feel involved in the family meal. “Someone puts out the cutlery, someone puts out the tablecloth,” Collins says. “And even a young child can have a go at helping with vegetable preparation, or, on the weekend, when you have more time get the kids involved with helping prepare a simple meal.”

Getting older children involved – especially teens – is more problematic, however CASA’s results should hearten parents engaged in that battle.

The overwhelming majority of teenagers said they preferred to eat dinner with their family – 84 per cent compared with 13 per cent who preferred dining solo.

For Collins, the beauty of the family meal ritual is that it can easily be distilled into a simple message.

“You don’t actually have to say, ‘Eat more vegetables,’ or ‘Hey, talk to your kids,’” she says. “All you have to say is ‘Eat meals at the table,’ and we know that they will get all these other benefits. It’s like an investment in your own family’s quality of life.”

Wiii- not all Fun and Games

This feature story printed in the New York Times had significant value to me and up to 20 million people worldwide who have purchased a Nintendo Wii Console in the past 2 years. The Wii is a an exercise revolution as it helps people get active and at the same time enjoy the glory of video games. This is a light hearted look at the impact of the Wii console and the actual real side-effects of the playing the Wii. The journalist who has injured himself playing the Wii explains the risks of playing the Wii but also the pros and how it helps elderly people get active. This article is a sporadic article looking at the Wiii console and its impact on society.

Users have had sprained ankles and repetitive stress injuries.

More Wii Warriors Are Playing Hurt

By ANDREW DAS

Published: April 20, 2009

In the moments after I felt the pop in my left shoulder, the sensation I felt was not pain. It was panic. How exactly does a 40-year-old man explain to his wife that he might have torn his rotator cuff during a midnight game of Wii tennis?

Dr. Charles Young made me feel better without even examining me.

Late last year, Dr. Young, an orthopedic surgeon, spent about an hour experimenting with the balance games and strength-training exercises on his new Wii Fit. Running on a virtual trail. Slalom skiing. Walking on a tightrope. “They have this hula-hoop one where you’re supposed to spin yourself in a circle and try to get a high score,” said Dr. Young, who is completing a sports medicine fellowship at the Cleveland Clinic. “I was really hurting.”

In the operating room the next day he commiserated with several nurses who confessed that they had, at least figuratively, already felt his pain.

To say that Wii injuries are an epidemic would be an overstatement, but they are proliferating along with the popular video-game system. Interviews with orthopedists and sports medicine physicians revealed few serious injuries, but rather a phenomenon more closely resembling a spreading national ache: patients of all ages complaining of strains and swelling related to their use — and overuse — of the Wii.

Call it Wii Shoulder. Or Wii Knee. If there is an epidemic of anything, it probably falls under a broader label: Nintendinitis.

“Skateboarding, snowboarding, you name it,” said Dr. William N. Levine, the director of sports medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center. “Take the newest fad, and there’s always a slew of specific orthopedic injuries associated with it.”

The difference now is that the surging sales of the Wii system mean that misery gets more company every day. Nintendo, which introduced the Wii in November 2006, sold more than 10 million of the game systems in the United States last year, including a record 2.1 million in December. The complementary Wii Fit exercise program has been nearly as popular, with more than 6.5 million sold since its introduction last May.

Consumers who avoided sedentary video-game systems have flocked to the Wii, which lures users off the couch with a handheld, wireless remote and a selection of familiar, free-swinging games like tennis, boxing and bowling. For some parents, and even grandparents, the games are a way to connect with children on their own turf. The fact that everyone gets a little exercise along the way is an added plus.

“It’s great in the concept that it gets people active and involved,” said Dr. Brian Halpern, a sports medicine physician at the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manhattan. “It’s not great in that you get lost in that and are overloading areas that you haven’t worked out in a long time, if ever.”

Dr. Halpern said he had treated two types of injuries: traumatic injuries like twisted knees and sprained ankles from playing the games in confined spaces, and repetitive stress problems from playing too long. A common problem is the realization by players that a full swing is not required; a flick of the wrist is often enough to return a serve or bowl a strike. As several doctors pointed out, that is the exact motion — concentrating the force of a swing in the muscles of the forearm — that can cause tennis elbow.

The Wii system was built with warnings about prolonged use, and electronic prompts interrupt players regularly to urge them to take a break.

Denise Kaigler, a vice president for marketing and corporate affairs at Nintendo of America, said in an e-mail message that “as consumers adapt to this new style of play, there have been a few reports of minor incidents during overly enthusiastic game play,” but that more health and safety warnings — about playing in an area free of obstructions, for example — had been added.

“As with any new activity, people playing the Wii system should pace themselves and not overdo it,” Ms. Kaigler said.

Dr. John Sperling, a physician at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., called the aches and pains a sign of the times. “It’s a syndrome of injuries and people presenting with complaints that we couldn’t have imagined three years ago,” he said.

Dr. Levine said the youngest patient he had treated was 12. Dr. Young, who overworked his core muscles using the Wii Fit, is 32. Dr. Sperling’s patients have included a 22-year-old whose arm swelled to twice its size after a marathon Wii session, and a man in his 60s.

“I was asking him what happened,” Dr. Sperling said of the older patient, “and he said, ‘Well, we bought a Wii system for the grandkids. Next thing I know, my shoulder’s killing me.’ ”

Dr. Halpern, a former assistant team physician for the Mets, compared some Wii injuries to those sustained by professional athletes.

“It’s like if you have a pitcher who has gone to spring training and hasn’t worked hard in the off-season and starts throwing too much and kind of overloads his shoulder or elbow,” he said.

And just as that pitcher might have to take several days off, a person experiencing pain from a session of Wii games should do the same. While “the rush of beating kids a fraction of your age in Wii Sports far outweighs the discomforts of getting older,” Ms. Kaigler said, moderation is just as important. That may be especially true for older players.

My shoulder recovered with time away from the Wii, not a problem in a household with three children who were all eager to play and who are apparently more durable than their father. The lasting image of Christmas at my family’s home was that of my 5-year-old daughter in a velvet dress, blond hair tucked behind one ear, raining punches on a hulking man with a goatee. She knocked him out, but quickly moved on to baseball and bowling and golf.

Dr. Halpern said the shorter attention spans of younger children were probably preventing them from developing overuse injuries, describing their exposure to a variety of Wii games as “cross-training without even thinking about it.” Sore-shouldered and gimpy-kneed adults could be victims of their better focus, but also of their innate competitiveness.

“It’s good to be a kid at heart,” said Dr. Susan Joy, the director of the Cleveland Clinic’s women’s sports health program. “But sometimes when you start a new exercise program, it’s good to remember that you’re not a kid.”

Health Blogs- FitSense Australia

When looking at other blogs I found a really helpful blog called Fit Sense Australia 

This blog is helpful as it comes from an official organisation that provide research based wellness programs for clients. They provide health assistance for staff of organisations such as the AFL and Australian Customs.

It provides information and facts for these clients on topic’s such as excerise and nutritional health the basis of my blog beat

The Harsh Truth

This story was published in the Health Section of the Daily Telegraph and focuses is feature article which focuses on informing readers of the facts behind three types of substances which people enjoy to devour upon. Erica Watson interviews an academic, doctor and a dietitian and the quotes form the basis of her story. People will find this feature story helpful as it explains myths and mysteries surrounding the pro’s and con’s of chocolate, coffee and red wine. This story is a feature so not much other attention in the media has been given to this topic although just one month before this article the government set new guidelines on drinking standards stating that more then 2 glasses of red-wine is considered binge-drinking.

By Erica Watson

March 23, 2009 12:00am

WHEN it comes to our diet and its impact on our health, it can often feel like we are being bombarded with conflicting information. One minute we are told of wonder foods that ward off diabetes or slow the ageing process, the next we are told those same foods have the potential to send us to an early grave.

Choc, Red Wine and Coffee, 3 delightful substances

Chocolate, coffee and red wine are three of the substances which arouse the most heated debate and confusion.

It seems that no sooner is one study released espousing their health benefits than another crops up to contradict it.

To determine whether chocolate, coffee and red wine are friend or foe, T.health sought the opinions of a panel of experts, comprising dietitian Susie Burrell, Sydney-based GP and AMA Public and Preventative Health Committee chairman Dr John Gullotta, and Professor of Human Nutrition at the University of Sydney, Jennie Brand-Miller.

Chocolate

It’s been claimed chocolate offers a number of benefits, from reducing the risk of heart disease to lowering the risk of pre-eclampsia in pregnant women.

Flavonoids found in cocoa are known to be a rich source of antioxidants. But before reaching for the family block of Dairy Milk, remember it also contains trans and saturated fat as well as high levels of sugar.
High-quality dark chocolate is said to contain a greater cocoa content and therefore more antioxidants, yet these levels can be influenced by the production process.White chocolate has no flavonoids at all.

The dietitian:

“Eating small amounts of chocolate can be consistent with a healthy diet and will offer the protection of extra antioxidants.
“If you have an active lifestyle and can afford the extra kilojoules in your diet, then block chocolate could be your choice. If you want to avoid extra kilojoules then cocoa powder can be taken as a drink or used in low-kilojoule recipes.”

The doctor:

“Chocolate is an energy-dense food that can contribute strongly to total kilojoule intake.
“Placing something like chocolate as a prime food in a healthy diet sends out a confusing message to the community.
“It’s best to have an intake of natural antioxidants and not those from foods rich in fat and sugar.”

The academic:

“The antioxidative property of chocolate comes mainly from flavonoids.
“The flavonoid content of chocolates depends on the cocoa content and the processing of the cocoa. Raw cocoa powder is found to contain more flavonoid than the alkali-processed ones.”

Coffee

While some see their daily cappuccino as a prerequisite for starting the day, others consider it an addictive drug.

Caffeine is a stimulant that affects the central nervous system. Commonly found in coffee, tea and soft drinks, it contains antioxidants that can reduce the risk of diabetes.

Caffeine can help us stay alert and may improve physical performance, however it can also cause sleep disturbance and withdrawal symptoms.

The dietitian:

“In small amounts caffeine can make you feel more alert and full of energy, however in large amounts it can make you feel nervous and restless.
“If you have a lot of caffeine you may feel withdrawal symptoms such as headaches, tiredness, anxiety and irritability if you stop having caffeine.”

The doctor:

“Caffeine can increase alertness in some people, but there is very little evidence for an effect on performance and energy levels.
“Some people seem to be able to tolerate much more caffeine than others, however 250mg (approximately) will probably cause some mild effects.
“It is an addictive drug which can cause disturbed sleep, raised blood pressure, anxiety, headache and a fast and irregular pulse.”

The academic:

“Caffeine is one of the few substances proven to enhance physical performance. But we are talking about microseconds and elite athletes, not your weekend warriors.
“Unfiltered coffee contains a group of compounds called diterpenes, which were proven to be very potent in raising LDL (bad) cholesterol. These diterpenes are hiding in the tiny oil droplets floating on the coffee. Filtered coffee or instant coffee contains no or little diterpenes because the oil droplets have been removed.”

Red wine

Antioxidants called polyphenols found in red wine have been known to have positive effects on the body.

In moderation, studies have shown red wine can reduce the risk of heart disease and even help slow the progression of neurological disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. But a few glasses too many can be linked to major diseases, including cancer.
Recently released Australian drinking guidelines recommend that men and women consume no more than two standard drinks a day to reduce the risk of alcohol-related injury and disease.

The dietitian:

“Evidence suggests that a serve of red wine contains polyphenols and flavonoids which can help increase levels of good cholesterol in the bloodstream.
“In moderation, alcohol can be part of a healthy diet and healthy lifestyle, however drinking large amounts of alcohol can be harmful.”

The doctor:

“It has been well documented that moderate amounts of alcohol can raise your good cholesterol (HDL cholesterol) and thin your blood.
“Regular heavy drinking can cause cancer, cirrhosis (liver damage), high blood pressure, heart disorders, strokes and stomach ulcers.
“Alcohol in pregnancy can cause brain damage, low birth weight and deformities of the baby’s face. Harm to the baby may occur with as little as several drinks per week.”