Engels |Thema Food
CExtra reading5– Food and Health
EXERCISE:
Complete the passage with the correct paragraphs from A to G.
Attention: There is one more paragraph than you need!
Aften the cigarette manufacturers, it has become the turn of the food processors to suffer the attacks of those who would have us lead a healthy life. Sometimes you have the feeling that almost everything you eat is liable to damage your brain, clog your arteries, ulcerate your stomach, or impact your intestine.
[01]…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
One dietician writes that people wouldn't buy a pork pie if chemicals had not been designed into them. A pork pie can contain as much as 50 per cent of highly saturated fat which is bad for the heart and arteries.
[02]…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
The additives in the pie do little harm in themselves. The fat is made acceptable by a perfectly safe emulsifier. Added colour, which makes the fat look like meat, might cause a few people to have allergic reactions. The anti-oxidant, put in the pie to prevent the fat going rancid, may be a natural one. And sodium glutamate, used as a flavour enhancer, may be all right in limited quantities.
[03]…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Since a study by Johns Hopkins Medical Centre, Baltimore, in the mid-eighties, coffee has been on everyone's blacklist. According to the study, regardless of the measure of coffee consumption used, analyses found that heavy coffee drinkers were almost three times more likely to have coronary disease than were non-drinkers. Even one or two cups of coffee a day appear to be associated with a small extra risk of heart disease - a one-third increase over non-drinkers. Coffee drinkers are more likely to suffer form angina, heart attacks or sudden death caused by a coronary.
[04]…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Few arguments create greater passion among medical experts than the postulated link between diet and heart disease. Throughout the seventies, the link seemed to be irrefutable. The work of Ancel Keys in America showed that heart disease correlated in different countries with dairy food consumption. His work was supported by studies of Japanese migrants to the United States who developed the heart disease pattern of their adopted country. By the end of the eighties, however, a reaction had set in. Some doctors refused to accept any connection between diet and heart disease. They have argued that diets which cut back on dairy produce, although unlikely to cause physical harm, could lead to malnutrition, particularly among children.
[05]…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
The nutritionists have fought back. They remain convinced that sugary, fatty foods lead to preventable ill health. One doctor argues that a fibre-rich diet is only of use to those who suffer from diabetes. Rubbish, say the nutritionists, and go on to point out that "over one third of British adults are constipated. At least one in seven takes laxatives. And dietary fibre is of proven value in the treatment of constipation."
[06]…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
What we do know is that nutrition does affect health. Too little food and too much food are both bad for you. In Britain, poor boys tend to be two inches shorter on average than rich boys. Anecdotal evidence is not really convincing, on the basis that one swallow does not make a summer. Still, I do remember as a dreadful warning the landlord of the lodgings I stayed in for a while. At breakfast in the morning, he would drink half a cup of warm bacon fat taken from the frying pan, slap his belly, and say: "Bacon fat. That's good for you." His skin was tight and glistening. He could have understudied Jaws. Anyway, a month or so after I left I heard that he had died, suddenly, of a heart attack. Of course, one swallow doesn't make a heart attack: you have to take quite a few of them.
Paragraphs to choose from:
A.The study did not look into the risks of tea or cola drinks, but as these drinks also contain caffeine, their heavy consumption would be expected to carry similar risks. The one piece of good news appears to be that the risk decreases rapidly once a person stops drinking coffee.
B.A perfectly good pork pie could be made from reasonable ingredients but it is cheaper to make it with additives because less meat is then needed.
C. They are appalled that breakfast, that traditional British meal, should be under attack by the spectre of disease. Come between some doctors and their bacon and eggs and feelings will run high.
D. It is possible that bad health is more a matter of genetic make-up than dietary habits. Healthy parents, with an active way of life, tended to have active healthy children. Parents who were themselves weakly, or who led excessively passive television-bound lives, tended to breed couch potatoes.
E. There may be a wholemeal crust, but the additives in it deceive out senses and persuade us to eat too much fat. Even if the additives themselves are considered to be relatively safe, the nutritionalconsequences are appalling.
F. Yet another doctor argues that dental decay should really be seen as a disease which results from a lack of fluoride. What we need to do is clean our teeth like crazy, have them coated with sealants, and take fluorides daily. The nutritionist blasts back by pointing out that you might as well say that headaches are caused by a lack of aspirin.
G. On the other hand, it is certainly true that there is nothing like reading the list of ingredients on the back of a cereal packet or a pot of jam to put you off your breakfast. As for sausages and pork pies - they might have been concocted by the Borgias.
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