I remember when my second child was born, I was living in SF and the people in the next room to the waiting room (in the hospital where the OB Dr was) were black teenagers from one of the ghettos there. Yes, “liberal” San Francisco was very segregated.
In any case, it was a Catholic hospital and they had a project going on to prevent infant and maternal mortality that involved medical personnel and a nutritionist. The nutritionist had asked the girls to write down what they had eaten the day before. Reponses? Nothing but potato chips and sodas.
The nutritionist had a chart where she would track how they had followed the diet plan and how many had added vegetables, real meat, or even taken their pre-natal vitamins. I think there was only one of them who actually did any of this.
Btw, they all got food stamps, welfare up one side and down the other, and their medical was being paid for...So it’s not a lack of resources.
This kid in England actually sounds pretty typical. I couldn’t believe it until I saw it, but many lower income Brits appear to live on something called a c chips buddy, which is a sandwich of white bread and French fries.
Nothing but potato chips and sodas.
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And the thing about eating that kind of food is it doesn’t really satisfy anything but your superficial taste addictions, your body is not satisfied as it would be after a real meal. So you crave more and more food, and eat more and more chips, and get bigger and bigger.