Wednesday 19 May 2010

That's Ketchup Tackled, Now For The Bacon Sarnie

You can almost smell it, can't you?

Yesterday, I mentioned the significance of Heinz surrendering in the face of legislative threats from public health interventionists.

The capitulation of Heinz is a major scalp. It's the significant domino which authoritarians worldwide have been praying for. Other companies will soon fall into line once they realise that even a massive company like Heinz has been brought to heel.
You see, it's a feature of such campaigners that once they have achieved one 'goal', they immediately dust their hands off and look around for a more challenging target. Or 'the next logical step' as they like to term it.

And because there are so many of them, interfering with government money, it's usually a safe bet that another branch will have laid the groundwork in preparation.

So it was less than surprising to see yesterday that, having seen off Heinz, they've already found bigger, err, bacon to fry. (emphasis mine)

Eating processed meat such as sausages increases the likelihood of heart disease, while red meat does not seem to be as harmful, a study suggests.

A Harvard University team which looked at studies involving over one million people found just 50g of processed meat a day also raised the risk of diabetes.

This is defined as any meat preserved by smoking, curing or salting and includes bacon, sausages, salami and other luncheon meats.

Salt can increase blood pressure in some people, a key risk factor for heart disease.
Diabetes and heart disease, and there's that wicked salt again. But that's not all. Oh no, it's far more dangerous than that.

Not so long ago they told us that processed meat causes cancer too.

A dramatic fall in the consumption of processed meat such as bacon and ham would stop around 3,700 people a year from developing bowel cancer, scientists warn today.

Professor Martin Wiseman, scientific and medical adviser to the World Cancer Research Fund, said: "The evidence on processed meat is convincing and our scientists estimate that up to about 3,700 cases of bowel cancer could be prevented every year in the UK if everyone ate less than 70g of processed meat a week, which is roughly the equivalent of three rashers of bacon."
That's just about everything in place for a full frontal assault. Invocation of the public's most feared conditions - cancer, heart attacks, diabetes - along with a previously prepared culprit, salt, and just to top it off, a very precise scary number of possible deaths to add to the 'definite' ones they already attribute to salt.

More than 14,000 people are dying each year because we are overdosing on salt, it claims.
And, as they never tire of telling us, something will most definitely have to be done about it.

If the humble ketchup can be forcibly doctored by pressure from government, can anyone confidently rule out the same for bacon, salami or sausages on this 'overwhelming evidence'? And before you answer that, please take into account the general dozy and gullible nature of our politicians.

At the moment we are still at the advisory stage, but that's quite normal procedure. Sooner or later, such an approach will be deemed to have failed and stronger, coercive, action will be demanded.

Elimination of salt is almost a definite, banning preservatives could feature too, both of which will make processed meat very difficult, or impossible, to produce without significant cost to the consumer I would imagine. Not to mention perhaps making it unattractive to buy purely in taste terms.

Maybe they'll follow the course trodden by anti-alcohol campaigners and call for bacon to be sold in smaller portions - say, packs of 3 slices only. And you can bet your mortgage/rent/grandmother that there will soon be calls for processed meat to be officially banned in kids' lunchboxes.

Then, once another little avenue of pleasure has been closed off for us, they will direct their co-ordinated efforts towards the 'next logical step' for a pristine health-religious life ... for everyone, whether we like it or not.

Red meat itself, probably. They won't be happy till we're all feasting on mung beans and pine nuts.

It's all for your own good, doncha know.


13 comments:

Ian R Thorpe said...

Then they came for the bacon and I did not speak....

What next, our pies?

Monty Cristo said...

As ever, the Daily Mash was ahead of itself back in 2007 when it published the following statement:

'Meanwhile bacon campaigners have issued a series of recommendations for health experts if they wish to carry on living instead of perishing in a huge fireball after someone pours petrol through their letterbox and sets light to it with a flaming rag, including:

* Leave bacon out of this
* Shut up about bacon
* Mention bacon again and you’re fucking dead
* Don't even look at those sausages'.

The full article is at :

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/health/leave-bacon-out-of-it%2c-health-experts-warned-20071031506/

Anonymous said...

Are the anti-processed meat Righteous in coalition with the AGW hysterics?

I heard one of the official Righteous use the phrase 'next logical step' the other day. I'd love to see it become a term of derision with anyone hearing it collapsing with laughter. Even the Righteous hate being laughed at and they'd soon stop using it. When they've stopped using it, they might stop thinking it...

Jay

Anonymous said...

Mung beans are good for you
Sprouts are excellent
Cabbage superb
Cauliflowr supreme
...........BUT.....................
The non stop farting leaves life
meaningless and void of friendship.

Herr Doktor Grossfurzer.
Durchfall Spezialist

Mark Wadsworth said...

Oh Dick, grow up. Can't you remember the simple rhyme:

"If it's tasty, put it back!
Or else you'll have a heart attack.
If it looks and smells like poo,
It's probably Very Good For You."

BTS said...

Well that's just bloody great..

Everyone's going to die and I'm going to be stuck on this miserable planet with no-one but Bollock Rose for company.

I'm off to take up recreational cyanide use..

Unknown said...

BTS, think of the fun you could have.

Am imagining an 'invasion of the bodysnatchers' scenario with you and your vodka as head of the resistance. You don't sleep anyway so you would be just fine :-)

Just make sure you have a huge stock of vodka and fags before you go into hiding....

Joe Public said...

But we haven't enough dosh in the Pension Kitty to support all those hundreds of thousands of people living longer due to a healthier lifestyle.

Bucko said...

Sainsburys online sell bags of salt for 16p each. I've been stocking up for next winter in case salt runs out again.
At this rate I might be able to start a thriving black market instead.

Dr Evil said...

I eat bacon about once a week sausage too. I ain't giving it up.

However, I suppose gentleman's Relish would be out of the question? This is so salty you can only eat a very thin spread of it, but it is tasty!

BTW, there are some really excellent new therapies for bowel cancer.

Sam Duncan said...

“Salt can increase blood pressure in some people, a key risk factor for heart disease.”

Aha! See that sneaky “some” there? That's an admission, that is. “Some people” is “anyone with already dangerously high blood pressure”.

It's almost exactly 13 years since the then new government banned the antihistamine Terfenadine because it had led to heart attacks when combined with grapefruit juice. I don't even like bloody grapefruit juice. I had the measure of these bastards there and then. No eventuality is too unlikely for a ban, and warnings aren't enough; we're not to be trusted to heed them.

(WV: imilkin. Apple moves into the dairy farming equipment market?)

J Bonington Jagworth said...

R-i-g-h-t. So what happens to Marmite, which is 11% salt? Don't answer - I've probably just tipped off the food police, who instead of clamping down on everything with actual flavour, should be apologising abjectly for getting it wrong about the 5-a-day habit.

Whenever such stories appear in this household, we invoke Woody Allen's 'Sleeper', where he wakes up 200 years in the future to a dish of chocolate fudge cake and cream. He protests that he needs some health food (having previously existed on nuts and seeds), but the doctors assure him that what he is eating IS health food...

J Bonington Jagworth said...

@Mark Wadsworth

A corollary:

The black strap molasses
And the wholemeal bread
Make you live so long
You'll wish you were dead