The federal Liberals made it sound like they're doing something about the Canada Food Guide during an announcement Monday but it's just more needless talk.
Health Minister Jane Philpott announced that the feds were starting a consultation process, government-speak for senior bureaucrats collecting information that has already been compiled and making recommendations that have already been made.
The Senate did this work last year and put out a report in March, calling for an immediate overhaul of the national food guide to help combat an obesity crisis that is weighing down provincial budgets with soaring health care costs.
There's nothing the Senate can do that Parliament can't do better, however, so it's time to get busy with a new study and newer recommendations.
The public can have their say online until
Dec. 8. Crisis doesn't mean hasty, of course, so the government promises to have its new dietary guidelines in place by the end of 2018, two long years from now.
Health Canada already has all of the numbers.
Six out of 10 adults are overweight.
One-third of the kids weigh too much.
Four out of five Canadians are at risk to get cancer, heart disease or Type-2 diabetes because of their weight.
The provinces are happy to share their numbers on how much of their annual spending goes to health care and how that spending has been rising rapidly for years.
Everybody also knows who the three food stooges are.
Sugar, salt and fat make food taste so good but, over the long term, make our bodies feel so bad.
According to Health Canada, an average Canadian receives about one-third of their daily calories from foods and drinks loaded with fun and flavour.
Meanwhile, most Canadians don't eat enough fruit, veggies and whole grains, mostly loaded with extra servings of boredom and guilt.
Once the new Canada Food Guide is complete, politicians will talk more, lecturing Canadians on how to eat right, because it's our fault we're fat.
That ignores the billions of dollars spent annually in food research to develop new products for the grocery store aisle. This research, conducted primarily by the handful of multinational corporations that produce the majority of the products found on store shelves, is about luring consumers, from the taste, texture and appearance of the food to how the container looks on the shelf.
Michael Moss explains the intense scientific work and business competition of the food industry in his book Salt Sugar Fat: How The Food Giants Hooked Us.
A new national food guide will be competing against that money and those decades of research and experience in consumer preferences. As Moss explains, most people have no idea why they can't stop eating snack foods high in salt and fat while washing it down with cold beverages loaded with sugar.
The food manufacturers know, however, because their scientists hooked people up to brain scans while they were eating and drinking.
In Quebec, restricting marketing to kids of unhealthy food and drinks has been standard practice for decades, with the health minister pointing out that there seems to be lower consumption of those foods in La Belle Province. Yet more evidence is needed. Rather than using the Senate report and Quebec's tried-and-true regulations to make some immediate changes, the federal Liberals want to talk about it more.
The consultation itself may not be healthy.
When it comes to coffee, alcohol and red meat consumption, to name three examples, there is contradictory research on the benefit or detriment of these items on a regular basis in an adult diet.
Cholesterol, long thought to be unhealthy, either has no real impact on long-term health or can be beneficial in the right quantities, a growing body of study shows.
By the time kids are halfway through elementary school, even they know the difference between healthy and unhealthy food, regardless whether or not they have the self-control to make the right choices.
The federal government, however, needs another two years to figure it all out and get back to us.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
