Why I Don't Think School Food Reform = Nanny State

Bettina over The Lunch Tray, posted a link and commentary to a NYT article about the childhood obesity issue, who supports government intervention, who doesn't.  It got me thinking, and I ended up writing a long comment on her blog post, that I wanted to share here.

I grew up in Republican household with the belief that our great government should let our great people decide, and act on things for ourselves.  I think that's a fine mentality to have about consenting adults, but for children's health, I have a different perspective.

I think a highly packaged food diet harms children.  I think that kids who live with parents who are ignorant of nutrition deserve to have their schools, their churches, their community centers looking out for them.  I think the government should help everyone who feeds children including schools, restaurants, churches, etc. understand what it is they are feeding kids, and what it can do to a child's health if it is not eaten in moderation.  The government should also encourage organizations, and institutions feeding kids to do so in a nourishing way, not a health damaging way.  The government should enable operations to feed kids real food.  These kids are our people, our work force, our community.  They deserve health from anyone who can give it to them.

Junk Food in Moderation
Moderation does not mean packaged cereal or a cereal bar for breakfast, a lunchable and capri son for lunch followed by mac and cheese with a hot dog for dinner, filled in with goldfish and chex mix for snacks.  That is a 100% packaged food diet, and even though some of those items contain whole grains, proteins, fruit juice and are enriched with vitamins and minerals, it is not sufficient nourishment for a growing and developing child.

Why, oh why do people think that the government is trying to impose nanny state, when it is trying to protect children from harm?

A Nation of Sick People
What will happen to our nation when the majority of our current, next and future generations have serious health concerns?

• I'm not just talking about medical bills and high costs of health.  
• I'm talking about lost productivity for working adults who spend a lot of time at a Dr office or hospital managing conditions like high cholesterol, high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, overweight, sleep apnea, depression etc.  
• I'm talking about our great nation not being able to innovate, develop and prosper because our population is too sick to thrive.  That means a depressed economy, poor job conditions.  I don't know about you, but I want my kids to have great job opportunities when they get out of college.  
• I'm talking about your kids dealing with death among their peers as young people.  Dealing with early death of their future spouses, friends, co-workers.  The next generation will bear a lot of grief losing loved ones before old age.

My Job Is to Feed My Kids Right
Maybe your kids are fine because you know better, but what about the other kids in the class who can't learn  because their brain doesn't have the nutrients it needs to pay attention and sit still, causing classroom disruptions and making it hard for the teacher to teach all the students, including your healthy child?

Maybe your child will be healthy as an adult because they eat right, but what happens when their best friend who ate a packaged food diet and their boss at work and uncle have serious health concerns, possible early death because they didn't eat right.  Now your healthy adult child is needlessly experiencing a lot of grief losing loved ones.

Your healthy adult child will have co-workers who constantly miss work due to health concerns and he will have to pick up the slack for them in their absence. Being overburdened at work will make your child lose precious time with his wife, kids, family and friends.

Do we really want to march forward singing the tune of "I'm taking care of my family, you take care of yours?"

It's not about trust here.  I trust most parents to do the right thing for their kids.  Sure there are some parents who didn't really want to be parents that can't get their sh*t together.  But there are many many many capable, loving, attentive parents who are unknowingly damaging their childrens' health because it is counter-intuitive that the majority of the food in the grocery store is health damaging.  The damage is subtle.  You don't know until it's too late, and then when you do know, you can't point the finger at this ingredient or that eating habit.    

The medical community is still trying to figure out what causes all of our health problems.  Is it GM foods?  Is it chemical additives in our food?  Is it lack of real nutrients?  Is it an imbalance of nutrients?  Is it too much sugar?  Too much fake fat?

I'm not a doctor. I'm not a scientist.  I can't prove anything to you.  I can say that on a real food diet for the past seven years, I feel younger, more energetic and more well than I ever have before.   I have less illness, less minor aches and pains and more feeling-awesome-ready-to-greet-the-world days.  Why don't  we all want that wellness, that productivity, that level of contribution and connectedness for each of America's children?

Here is the comment I left on Bettina's TLT post.  I'm not editing it, just pasting it stream of consciousness as I wrote it.  Hope my emotions didn't muddle up my thoughts too much.

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I am always surprised when people link nanny state to a child's health.  A child can not feed himself.  He can not shop at the grocery store or prepare foods for himself.  He relies on his parents, his school and his community to do those things for him.

When parents and the community are ignorant of nutrition as so many people are, the child's health will suffer, precisely because our government allows food manufacturers to produce, market and sell entirely too much food that harms human health.

I also don't want the government to take away big macs.  But i do want the government to make a choice to care for the health of our country by saying, hey  John Q Public, go ahead and eat fast food, packaged food, soda and other low-fat food like factory made substances with no real ingredients as 95% of your diet over 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 decades.  Go ahead, but if you do you WILL get sick.   You will have IBS, or cancer,  become overweight, get diabetes, have high blood pressure, develop kidney stones,  etc.  That's not nanny state.  That's disclosure.   Same thing that we do with alcohol and cigarettes.

Kelly - unfortunately we do have to rely on the govt to make changes.  communities absolutely can plant gardens, teach kids about real food and offer more real food at school, home, and social gatherings. BUT.  In my experience, kids who like junky stuff, will NOT eat real food when junk is available.

However, when you remove the junk, kids, even those who eat a lot of packaged food, WILL eat real food.  When you add fresh fruits and vegetables to the school lunch line, a few kids eat them.  Most kids don't take them, and half that do toss them in the trash uneaten.

We saw that at Sherwood E when we did a taste-off competition.  Only thing on the menu was fresh fruits and vege.  No chips, no juice, no pretzels, no hotdogs.  82% of all students tried every thing offered.  http://tinyurl.com/4ugmwg8

When you teach kids why they should have them, a few more kids eat them.  As long as those fruits and vegetables are served along side chocolate milk and other carnival foods, kids will mostly not take advantage of any menu reform that is happening.    We saw that when we looked at the increase of fruits and vegetables consumed at Sherwood E after six months of nutrition education for all 400 of our students.  Fruit and Veg consumption increased, but we only gained a few new students eating fruits ( 25/335) and vegetables (52/335 for raw broccoli)  http://tinyurl.com/4j8pemg

Hmmm,  when students only have access to real food most will eat it.  When it is served along side carnival food most will not participate.

Until the govt changes the way school lunches are funded and reimbursed, the nutrition requirements for those lunches and gets rid of the hundreds of obstacles school food service groups have to actually delivering real food to students, not much will change in the area of school food.  

Unless every student receives nutrition education, any menu reform that does occur will have low acceptability.  Meaning it will be served, offered and either A) not taken from the line or B) tossed in the trash.

How do we get nutrition education to all students without asking the govt to make it so?

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Your two cents?  Do you think the government should help kids achieve wellness by helping schools, families and kids lose weight and prevent weight gain?