Like the climate change brigade, who believe that computer models derived from the data they themselves provide offer irrefutable evidence that we are all going to dry, drown, freeze to death or die of thirst some time soon, these nutrition experts created models, using NZ Statistics data, that apparently prove that a 20 per cent tax on salty, fatty foods and a 20 per cent subsidy on fruit and veg will have us all tucking into what little is left after the killer foods have been shunned. The list of what's going to kill us if we don't change our ways includes bread, breakfast cereals, processed meat, sauces and condiments, fresh meat (beef, lamb, hogget and poultry), all takeaway foods, butter, cream, milk, cakes, biscuits, cheese, pies, pizza, icecream, yoghurt and eggs. Doesn't leave a great deal. Fish without the batter, chips and tartare sauce should by okay, but not much else that doesn't come off a tree or out of the vegetable garden.
Apart from the fact that a 20 per cent tax might put some foods out of some people's financial reach (although an increase of say 40 cents for a dozen eggs is hardly likely to drive chooks to extinction), a tax of that order isn't going to mean much until it hits the likes of scotch fillet, which probably plays a minor role in our national mortality rate, while chopping 20 per cent off a kilo of apples isn't going to make them irresistible.
The researchers tell us that the 20 per cent tax would reduce overall mortality by 6.8 per cent, while taking 20 per cent off the price of fruit and veg would reduce it by 1.9 per cent, for a total reduction of 8.1 per cent (with some overlapping).
But there's more. If we stopped eating red meat the national beef herd and sheep flock would reduce (obviously we wouldn't export the meat we no longer eat, which is a small fraction of what comes off New Zealand farms), so greenhouse gas emissions, the bulk of which are produced by cows and sheep, would fall, saving another 4 per cent of us from an early death.
The only good news was that the effects of a sugar tax had not been modelled because the data relating to price and purchasing changes were 'unsound'. They must have been diabolical. The 2400 lives saved, incidentally, did not include those that would be spared by a greenhouse gas tax.
There is no doubt that price (taxes) can change the way people spend their money. We have seen that with tobacco. Education tends to get the credit, but the fact that a packet of fags now costs a small fortune probably has more to do with it. The same could happen with food. Make a steak and cheese pie worth $20 and they will lose some of their appeal. How many lives that would save remains open to question though. In any event, it's not going to happen, and that's what really makes this flight of fancy offensive.
Katherine Rich, from the Food and Grocery Council, got it right last week when she said she doubted that subsidising brussels sprouts by 20 per cent would make people eat more of them, or any other vegetable for that matter. Every New Zealander of sound mind would surely agree with that, and more importantly so would most politicians, sound of mind or otherwise.
It would be interesting to know if the people who came up with this madness follow their own advice when they go to the supermarket. If they do, perhaps a diet of sardines and kiwifruit has addled their brains.
Meanwhile, elsewhere on the food front, the Northland DHB has resolved not to pursue the modest savings promised by switching from meals cooked in hospital kitchens to frozen meals trucked north from Auckland. Hallelujah. A blow for common sense.
The DHB says it was concerned about the "operational risks" that would potentially accompany the importing of meals, as well as the impact on its staff and suppliers. One suspects that the former counted for much more than the latter, although in a spirit of generosity we might accept that hospital administrators really do care about the people they employ way down towards the bottom of the influence scale.
The nightmare for the DHB, though, would be feeding patients when the Far North is cut off from the rest of the world by floods.
This newspaper would love a story about fish fingers being choppered to Kaitaia Hospital, weather permitting, but an even better story would be patients going hungry until floodwaters fell at Moerewa or Kaeo.
No doubt the locals would go to the rescue, making soup and sandwiches until the crisis was over, although bread, being one of the main culprits of our mortality rate, would clearly be a risky option, and the fillings would obviously not include meat, eggs or cheese. Back to the sardines, no doubt.
Whatever it was that prompted the DHB's decision not, on this occasion, to chase the projected savings it was the right decision to make.
An unscientific survey of one patient at Kaitaia Hospital last week led to the official finding that the meals there were more than adequate, nicely varied and came in very generous servings. They also incorporated all the major food groups, although Otago, Auckland and Oxford universities might have declared them to be death fodder, given that many of the foods on their too salty/too fat list were there.
We all have to die of something though, and if it's one omelette or one shoulder of lamb with mint sauce too many that does it, c'est la vie. Beats choking on a brussels sprout.
