As the great end-of-year consumerist orgy returns, this series on the “cheapization” of the world ends with a examining the impact of cheap food, the fast food, like fast track to health problems and the obesity epidemic.
One pandemic can stick to another.
The Public Health Agency of Canada lists obesity “as a risk factor for severe disease and complications from COVID-19.” Significantly overweight people under the age of 60 are seven times more likely to be hospitalized in intensive care with infection. The coronavirus likes minuses less.
The politically incorrect California political comedian Bill Maher repeats that obesity is a much worse social problem than many others in his over-inflated country.
“In August 2021, 53 Americans died in a shooting, he observed in his show. Real Time (HBO) from September 6. This is terrible! Do you know how many died from obesity? 40,000! The humiliation of the fat [fat shaming] must not stop: it must come back. Smokers and those who do not wear seat belts are shamed. Polluters and most racists are shamed. Shame is the first step in reform. “
Excuse the little. If the population grows fat, there as here, it is obviously because it eats too much and badly while becoming sedentary more and more. We do not move, we stick to screens and we devour empty calories. In Quebec, one in five adults and one in nine children are considered obese.
“This is one of the great paradoxes of our society, where abundance becomes a problem,” summarizes Sébastien Rioux, holder of the Canada Research Chair in the political economy of food and well-being at the University of Montreal. . Some do not have enough and others overeat and eat poorly. “
Of all the objects in this series on the “cheapization” of the world, here is the one that has the most impact on the everyday life of everyone, from 7 months to 107 years old. Also in the United States, where this disease is worse, one in three children between the ages of 2 and 19 eats fast food at least once a day.
Professor Rioux, however, refuses to speak of an obesity epidemic. “It’s the medical aspect that tickles me,” he explains. We tend to medicalize the issue of overweight. That being said, there is undeniably an increase in the number of cases. The World Health Organization estimated that there were around 1.9 billion overweight adults in 2016, including 650 million obese. “
He also believes the number has increased over the past two years. The pandemic has not made him more active in any case. The Germans forged the neologism “ coronaspeck To describe the bacon added during containment.
Junk food geography
Sébastien Rioux is a full professor in the Department of Geography, which may seem strange at first. He explains that, on the contrary, the link between space and food remains fundamental. Food is produced in one place, processed in another, served yet elsewhere, often in a vast global movement.
“I come from the countryside,” he explains. I grew up in an agricultural environment. When I started my studies, I realized that food is at the heart of all social dynamics. “
One of the great transformations of the Industrial Revolution and the Green Revolution is that now the vast majority of people are consuming the food they do not produce. The French philosopher Michel Serres made the quasi-disappearance of the peasant one of the keys to reading the XXe century. “That means that a very small percentage of the population feeds 100% of society,” continues the professor from Quebec. This gives opportunities to develop other sectors. “
This revolution has made food very affordable, at least compared to older times. In the 1960s, still about a third of the household budget was used for food. Today, including restaurants, it would be between 12 and 15%. The recent inflation linked to the pandemic and to labor and supply problems will slightly modify this downward trend.
Sugar, salt and fat
However, it’s not the abundance of cheap food, good or bad, that alone causes the glut of fat bodies. “The cost and accessibility of this food have decreased a lot at the same time as skills or culinary capacities dwindle,” remarks Sébastien Rioux. It’s easier to have a pizza delivered or buy a frozen one than to prepare it. “
The professor adds as a cause the new lifestyles: we work and we are less physically active. It also recalls the changes in the food processing industry, which uses much more sugar, salt and fat in fast food as in grocery products, from frozen to prefabricated.
We must add the inequality in front of the grocery cart or the restaurant. The residents of all districts of a city, rich or poor, can well absorb too many fatty calories, obesity among the less well off also hides a “hidden hunger”, deficiencies in vitamins, micronutrients.
“When you live in a food desert, there is little chance of having access to fresh fruits and vegetables. Food often suffers. I’m not saying that you should stop eating pizza or poutine every now and then. But if you want a healthy population, you need a diverse food supply. When it becomes difficult to do otherwise, for a lot of reasons, we have a serious problem. “
The contrary signs are multiplying at the same time as the restaurants of fast food. Professor Rioux has observed what he has called “a repoliticization of food” for twenty years with vegetarianism, veganism, flexitarianism, organic, anti-speciesism, the demand for food sovereignty, regulations on food. ‘labeling, etc.
“This perspective amounts to saying that people have the right to feed themselves, and to decide what will be produced and how,” he concludes. More and more people are disgusted by the food system in place which is frankly harmful for the environment and health. “