Michael Pollan’s Food Rules
Michael Pollan’s latest, Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual, aims to distill all the food activist and author has learned into 64 simple rules:
The idea for this book came from a doctor–a couple of them, as a matter of fact. They had read my last book, “In Defense of Food”, which ended with a handful of tips for eating well: simple ways to navigate the treacherous landscape of modern food and the often-confusing science of nutrition. “What I would love is a pamphlet I could hand to my patients with some rules for eating wisely,” they would say.
“I don’t have time for the big nutrition lecture and, anyway, they really don’t need to know what an antioxidant is in order to eat wisely.” [...]
So I decided to take the doctors up on the challenge. I set out to collect and formulate some straightforward, memorable, everyday rules for eating, a set of personal policies that would, taken together or even separately, nudge people onto a healthier and happier path. I solicited rules from doctors, scientist, chefs, and readers, and then wrote a bunch myself, trying to boil down into everyday language what we really know about healthy eating. And while most of the rules are backed by science, they are not framed in the vocabulary of science but rather culture — a source of wisdom about eating that turns out to have as much, if not more, to teach us than nutritional science does.
#19 If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t.
#36 Don’t eat breakfast cereals that change the color of the milk.
#47 Eat when you are hungry, not when you are bored.
#58 Do all your eating at a table.
#64: Break the rules once in a while.
One of the places Pollan collected tips was from NYTimes’ readers. In their October Food Issue he posted he posted 20 of his favorites from the more than 2,500 he received there. Pollan discussed the book on The Daily Show last night, its first program of 2010. A highlight:
I think what’s about to happen, if we get this health care bill passed and there is some kind of minimal rules on pre-existing conditions and they can’t throw you off the plan, they have to take you, suddenly the health insurers will have an interest in your health that they don’t have now. Because right now the food industry creates patients for the health care industry.
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12 Responses to “Michael Pollan’s Food Rules”
“I think what’s about to happen, if we get this health care bill passed and there is some kind of minimal rules on pre-existing conditions and they can’t throw you off the plan, they have to take you, suddenly the health insurers will have an interest in your health that they don’t have now. Because right now the food industry creates patients for the health care industry.”
I'm not sure that makes much sense. Why would the insurers not have the same interest now in the people they do insure? Also, the last sentence, while undoubtedly true, seems a non-sequitur to me.
Why would the insurers not have the same interest now in the people they do insure?
Because they have and can find creative ways of minimizing the number of sick people they actually have to fund care for. Once the rules change, they are stuck with you. As it will be cheaper for them keep you healthy, it might make financial sense for them to start lobbying for change in the food industry. After all, they only have to keep you healthy until you turn 65.
Because the crooked insurance companies only insure the healthy, who, by definition, take good care of themselves to start with.
Worse than any excuse-making or any other misbehavior by the insurers is if government or silly activist groups try to push “food policy” social engineering on everyone. That is definitely unhealthy.
because now since the insurers can't turn you away they are going to be forced to pay for all your illnesses and in turn, for the first time ever, they're going to be concerned with what people are consuming because the american diet is killing us slowly.
“Once the rules change, they are stuck with you. As it will be cheaper for them keep you healthy”
Actually, it will be the (federal, more than state) government and taxpayers who seek to make health care cheap, or affordable, eventually, once government displaces the insurers (the trend the Left is too busy throwing tantrums or giving up, currently, to realize has been underway and which will continue).
I've just experienced the future of health care twenty years from now, during the past two days where I now am (agreed by workers at the hospital I visited, as well as fellow customers at a local pharmacy), but that's another story for another time.
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It is a Republican (traditional) idea that the responsibility for being healthy is the individual's. I agree with that. But, many people trust the government, and the Department of Agriculture, and many more choose lower prices, which for food in the USA means eating poisonous food produced in farm factories and herbicide and insecticide laden food from commercial farmers. And for everyone to make the right choices for their individual good, they need adequate, accurate information. That's not readily available nowadays.
It makes more sense than you seem to derive from it. Right now the insurance companies make lots of money because they select who they insure, and they only insure those who don't cost the insurance companies much or anything. They kick people off primarily by declaring 'a preexisting condition,' which has never been defined. Under the Health Care Bill, soon to be law, the insurance companies cannot do that. Saddled with people whose eating and exercise habits cause them to make frequent claims on the insurance companies, it will instantly become the insurance company's interest to counsel people to eat better and exercise.
Right now the insurance industry, the pharmaceutical industry, and the factory farms and commercial agriculture are all in the same fraternity. The factory farms and commercial agriculture produces people who need many pharmaceuticals, and the insurance company declares them all a preexisting condition. When the health care bill becomes law, the insurance companies will not be able to tolerate the factory farms any more. The pharmaceutical industry will continue to oppose any law or practice which cuts down on the consumption of pharmaceuticals.
In addition, both the pharmaceuticals and insurance companies directly benefit from federal laws that prevent competition, and factory farms enjoy direct subsidies.
The main subsidy the factory farms enjoy is an indirect one. It is the $3 Billion annual corn subsidy. It produces cattle with zero omega 3 oil, and deadly Escherichia coli 0157:H7. It also weakens the cattle so that they die after 18 weeks, immediately of a perforated liver. Their antibody system is largely destroyed by this abuse. These cattle are largely kept alive as long as they are, so that they can be slaughtered, by the copious use of antibodies, which medication is simply added to their food. So, because of the health consequences of feeding corn to cattle, the insurance companies, unable to eliminate prescribers for preexisting condition, or any other fatuuous reason, will have to come out against factory farms feeding corn to cattle. But, as about 70% of all antibiotics produced by pharmaceutical firms is sold to factory farms, these pharmaceutical firms will staunchly defend the factory farms.
Ever since Nixon, governments in the USA contend that we need the subsidy for corn, presumably despite the illnesses and premature deaths it causes, because the people will not tolerate expensive food. However, the food now produced is very expensive, if you factor in the lost wages due to sickness and premature death, and the hospitalization costs for atherosclerosis and cancers caused by this food. If you add all of these costs in, the increase in costs of beef which is pasture or hay fed is quite cheap.