Why Profits are Put Before Public Health – and it’s Getting Dangerous

Further back in time, women were healers, often using herbs and natural medicines. When we think of Medieval people today, the most likely picture in our minds is of of people carrying out old wives’ tales (maybe that was a slur to discredit such women healers) or biding by religious superstitions.

Men have dominated politics, science, religion, media and science for much of history. Women have been kept out, sidelined or even ridiculed. However, more women today can become influential and speak up, at least before those tackling ‘sensitive’ issues have been forced to toe the line or keep quiet. NHS figures show that four times more female junior doctors will commit suicide than male ones.

Increase Immunity

To increase immunity, people used to expose themselves and their children to non-lethal sicknesses, such as chicken pox, while the BCG vaccination for tuberculosis tested for natural immunity. The Plague of 1665 was transported to Eyme in the Peak District, which had to be quarantined until no one carrying the contagion was left alive. The plague was wiped out because it killed everyone who came into contact with it who was not immune. The first vaccination – coming from the Latin for cow – was invented when its inventor noticed people who had contracted the harmless Cow Pox would become immune to Small Pox, which was much more serious.

There is a huge amount of pressure out there, which varies from competing messages, tabloid blasts, political bullying, trolling on social media and public shaming. This is the modern version of pillorying someone with fruit in the village stocks. There are many other ways to coerce people into a certain way of thinking.

However, no amount of governments, scientists, the media or religions can create extreme weather, Tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes, tornadoes, hurricanes or COVID-19.

Nature makes all of these and all humans can do is respond to them. Unfortunately, special interests make this into a Gordian Knot of conflict of interest. The issue will be tangled in complicated language, superfluous words with no message, secrecy, wrapped as news entertainment and control. An example of a fight against truth is the Health Professional Council of South Africa against Professor Tim Noakes. The environment for searching or speaking up for truth has become riddled with risks.

Money is heavily invested to create products to sell to people. Seeing TV advertising for example. Gambling, junk food and alcohol are frequently promoted. While Nature causes all kinds of devastation, the men in politics, religion, media and science only want to do it their way, not consult a more diverse group of perspectives: They develop products, services and ideas to sell and find a way to make people need those products, services and ideas. Nothing else seems to matter and they do not think about the consequences.

If they did think about the consequences, they would be prepared for Coronavirus. Maybe they are prepared for it, but want to exploit it.

Qualified experts could be called in. People working on the front line to handle each Flu epidemic, which kills thousands each year. Studies and observations could be carried out to recognise patterns of contagion, for instance, are people immune to COVID-19 once they have recovered or is reinfection more dangerous.

In terms of public health, Italy is being responsible. As we all know a test exists to detect COVID-19 before symptoms appear – it remains hidden for up to 3 weeks or even 24 days. In Italy, everyone can be tested for free, which means we can rely on their figures of infection.

On BBC Spotlight, two women were invited on to the news program to answer questions, one of which was “how do we tell the difference between Coronavirus and flu?’ They failed completely to give any satisfactory answer.” This is an example of how the media is not playing its part at all. It is being irresponsible and just protecting its special interests.

Gender Struggle

There is definitely a gender struggle going on. The female approach is by nature to care, nuture, protect, communicate, gather information and put people before profits. That means finding a solution that is best for people not for business.There are women who have an agenda, often an ulterior financial motive or threat of loss, which makes their actions unnatural. An example is the woman who cost South African taxpayers thousands of pounds by submitting a complaint against Professor Tim Noakes over a tweet, while hiding her interest as president of the Association of Dietitians South Africa and a conflict of interest with their funders.

The male approach, in general and very much with exceptions, is to think it knows best, to dismiss other perspectives, to not consult or listen to anyone else – as the Conservative Party are not consulting the accountancy profession for the budget this year – to demand control and pursue a business rather humane outcome. Society, the press and business have all encouraged men to be more confident than women.

Can you believe the arrogance of the advice above? This is given to us by the NHS and Public Health England. Notice how they justify allowing the food and drink consortium, retailers and manufacturers in a righteous manner. They know plenty of people doubt their integrity, so they become more heavy handed.”Base meals on potatos, bread, rice (doesn’t say ‘brown for any of these) or other starchy carbohydrate (no essential vitamins or minerals, just energy and fillers) “choosing wholegrain versions where possible (a weak attempt to hold onto the tiniest thread of integrity for a vastly wrong piece of advice). These people are clearly unqualified and know nothing about nutrition so why are they telling us what to eat?

The advice continues: “Have some dairy of dairy alternatives choosing lower fat or lower sugar options.” Why didn’t they say. “choosing NATURAL?”. Low fat diets are now proven to not be better for our health.

Therefore, we are not listening to nature to try to work out why things happen and what to do about them. In public health, for example, all sorts of special interests are adding to the confusion This results in the public’s lack of confidence in using their own knowledge, research, instincts, networks or sources of information in the face of official guidelines, spread through the press and manipulating group think into one conventional viewpoint.

This means that anyone who strays is pulled back in by the general public, who are being brainwashed by the system.

Browbeat us into doing what we are told

Look at the language used to browbeat us into doing what we are told. Public Health England, that justifies its inclusion of the food industry in its consultation about nutritional guidelines, literally uses the adjective “evidence based” to either fight down opposition or persuade us that their research – biased by funding from special interests – is in evidence based. To me, providing compelling evidence shows something is evidence based, not expecting us to take their word for it just with an adjective.

The result of the conflict of interest over our food is the Eatwell Guide, or MyPlate in America. Processed food is well represented, although it contains none of the essential nutrients and vitamins we need to be healthy. Notice how official this is made to look and how it tells you not to argue with it.

The justification for the processed foods all recommended in a “balanced diet” is research done, for instance this document from America, to justify enriching and fortifying processed foods with dietary supplements to sell them for a higher price The justification given to governments is to reduce the nutritional deficiencies in an increasingly obese and diabetic nation. Instead of looking at why obesity, heart disease and diabetes are on the rise and providing people with actual evidenced based information through the press so they can make the right dietary choices, this is an opportunity to sell more product and tell people they need to buy it. The Independent reveals these special interests at work.

Meanwhile, the NHS has a guide to essential vitamins and minerals. I used it to produce a chart with what foods give us what nutrition we need for our bodies to be healthy and fight illnesses, which have a shopping list down below. This is for my preferred diet, real food and without dairy, but the source of this information provides all the items, including – of course – fortified foods to get what you need whether a vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian or omnivore.

It is ironic on this section of the NHS website how they repeat under every single vitamin and mineral “You should be able to get all the vitamin and minerals you need from your diet.” Here is what they want us to think.

• Notice they say “you should” not “you will”. The should is imperative.
• Why do they need to tell us about vitamins and minerals if the Eatwell Guide tells us what to eat?
• Why are many of the foods on the Eatwell Guide not mentioned for any essential nutrient
• They are trying to discourage people from taking dietary supplements or telling people about deficiencies.
• They do not mention quantities except for only eating liver once a week.
• Nowhere on the Eatwell Guide do they mention limits to how much we should eat.

Here are the sources of information about essential vitamins and minerals, that are not intended for the public’s eyes. This is to combat the growing obesity, diabetes, heart and kidney problems. These reports undoubtedly stem from the amount of vitamin and mineral deficiency spreading over western cultures, which is dangerous as our bodies are not able to fight illness or infection as well as they should with all the nutrients and vitamins they need.

However, reports like these are distinctly being used to justify food manufacturers plans to enrich and fortify foods to tell people they need and sell for a higher price. To do this they use the same dietary supplements that the NHS, the press, Harvard Health and other “official bodies” don’t inform us about, caution us and tell us we should get enough from our diet (which they hope includes processed foods fortified and enriched with dietary supplements, instead of us taking responsibility for our own health.

Taken from the American advice linked above, this is just such a lie:

The USDA Food Patterns show that an eating pattern with enough foods from all food groups to meet nutrient needs without eating too many calories has only limited room for calories from added sugars”.

They do talk about nutrients. See this:

When sugars are added to foods and beverages to sweeten them, they add calories without contributing essential nutrients.

This is massively biased. Added sugars? This does say that we need essential nutrients. Just how we get them is, as in the statement above, is not from added sugars. That is all they are giving us

What official guidelines are telling us to do is:

• To get all our essential nutrients and vitamins, and;
• eat enough food from all food groups to meet nutrient needs
• Not eating too many (above 2000 a day) calories.
• Leaving a little room for added sugars, which they have said don’t contain essential nutrients.

This is serving so many business interests while betraying public interests.

Essentially, nutritionists such as Dr Zoë Harcombe are worth following. Her advice is:

• Eat real, eat seasonal and where possible eat local produce
• Choose foods so you get your essential nutrients and vitamins
• Restrict eating to a maximum of three good meals a day. Ideally have 12 hours of the day, including sleep time, without eating.
• if you want to lose weight and for ease of digestion, eat protein and fats with vegetables OR a wholegrain or low GI carbohydrate such as brown rice or jacket potato, root vegetables, pulses or, beans with leafy green vegetables and avoid having proteins and fats with carbohydrates in the same meal. .

My Story

My grandparents, parents, my brother and I all went to boarding school, which means you are subjected to the food served in the refectory and eat it under the gaze of many people’s eyes. Boarding schools, particularly girls ones, are rife with eating disorders. My parents were born at the beginning of World War 2 and had rationing until they were teenagers. My maternal grandfather was a doctor who qualified in the early 1930s and worked at a London hospital and had a GP practice on Harley Street in London, where he was a research fellow on immunology and allergies with the Royal College of Physicians and wrote frequent papers for the British Medical Journal and Lancet. He believed in treating the whole body and to never stop learning. His father was a doctor in Buckingham.

Real food was the order of the day in the 1970s and we had a kitchen garden where we grew fruit and vegetables. My mother cooked at home and my parents ate forgotten nutritious foods such as liver, kidneys, sardines and plenty of greens.

When the 1980s came along and diet fads started, as well as more processed foods becoming available – which my parents worked hard to resist – official bodies started to tell us about calories and fatty foods, which had played a big part in my parents’ diets. They then started to worry about their weight and look for answers.

My brother cut out simple carbs, such as toast, potatoes and bread in his late teens and slimmed down from his starchy school diet after he left. He has kept slim ever since. However, my brother has been in full time education or work his whole life.

Myself

Despite being slim up to the age of 33, I didn’t feel it. Being born without a working thyroid gland, I had always been told my weight would fluctuate. Picking up on my parents’ anxieties about food, I began to watch what I ate as well. We, as a family, were very susceptible to official dietary advice, such as low fat and calorie restriction. Despite this, I worked full time and veered towards real food and went to markets and natural shops to buy what I ate. When in a full time job, I found healthy places to eat or took in a salad.

What I didn’t know at this point was that the bloated feeling and croaky voice every morning was caused by an intolerance to mass farmed milk.We hear about lactose intolerance but not casein, the protein in milk. A1 beta casein is the result of cows that originate from Northern Europe.

• A1 beta-casein. Milk from breeds of cows that originated in northern Europe is generally high in A1 beta-casein. These breeds include Holstein, Friesian, Ayrshire, and British Shorthorn.
• A2 beta-casein. Milk that is high in A2 beta-casein is mainly found in breeds that originated in the Channel Islands and southern France. These include Guernsey, Jersey, Charolais, and Limousin cows (1Trusted Source, 2Trusted Source).

In the 1980s, low fat spreads, milk, cheese, yogurt and other products started to appear. Messages to eat these came thick and fast through the press. We were exposed to a jungle of health food messages. A health food shop was spaghetti junction of agendas, from wheat free, gluten free, low fat, vegan, vegetarian, and sugar free (with sweeteners instead) and they were cash cows for food producers with often pale, zitty, drained-looking youths working the tills.

In 2003, aged 32 I left a full time job of 5 years and my weight started to go up. I panicked. Throughout the 90s I had stayed a good weight, mostly following Fit For Life by Harvey Diamond. With all the activity, yoga, tennis, babmington, walking around London and swimming, i relaxed my diet and enjoyed meals out with friends. My weight started to go up, so I panicked. This is what happened in the real world:

• Whenever I mentioned concerns about my weight, people said “eat less exercise more” I felt uneasy about this, as if the person was dishing out advice without really being bothered.
• My dad kept telling me to eat “little and often” and that I ate “a lot and often”.
• I thought it might be the lack of exercise walking to and from the station on way to work.
• I went to a nutritionist who focused on calories and advised me to have a maximum 2 eggs a week.
• I avoided fatty foods and ate tofu and Quorn rather than real meat.
• I tried eating only raw food for a year, put on weight, had no energy and got anemic.
• I went to the gym and treated myself afterwards.
• I played tennis and had a few pints at the bar afterwards.
• I always thought of my brother getting slim by cutting out potatoes, pasta, bread and toast and the Atkins diet but was scared that I wouldn’t get a balanced diet.
• I felt that diets were more like religions than science.
• I hated hearing about “allowances” but could eat a lot of food and felt judged for it.
• I drank beer as it was easier to spend more time in the pub talking to friends than stronger drinks.
• When I couldn’t afford the best food, I ate cheaper and less nutritious food, needing more of it.
• People gave tidbits of advice, such as to have some apple cider vinegar each day.

The instincts I had were:

• I needed a quality nutritional diet.
• To not eat junk food or snack.
• The less food I needed the more nutritious it was.
• To eat seafood and swim in the sea as much as possible.
• When I felt OK, I got fuller more quickly.
• When I worked from home I had a propensity to snack.
• Food was more important than exercise to keep a healthy weight.
• To reduce carbs such as pasta, rice, potatoes and bread.
• Olive oil is good. (probably without bread).
• Dietary supplements help fill gaps in natural intake of vitamins.

Notices in restaurants about allergies and intolerances seem to be empty statements. The press talks about food intolerances like unwelcome guests at a dinner party or unwanted customers in a restaurant. Requests to have no dairy are met with inconsistent responses when ordering food. Unless you say ‘no salt, no dairy, no carbohydrates such as salad instead of bread and chips, you get a predominantly starchy meal in many restaurants, especially vegan and vegetarian ones.

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