Fast food outlets are often blamed for the obesity epidemic across the UK. However, the outlets themselves are not necessarily to blame, and rather the cooking practises and suppliers of the food that may be more accountable.
The Centre for Food Policy, based at City University London, published a report last year investigating the causes of coronary heart disease in East London, found transfats at the heart (excuse the pun) of the issue.
Transfats are oils, often synthetic, created during the cooking process. If oils are used repeatedly then their structure breaks down and as well as cooking the food they saturate it with fats and energy that cannot be digested or broken down by the body. Cholesterol rises and accordingly so does the chance of serious health problems, especially those linked to heart disease.
Around one in six deaths in Tower Hamlets can be linked back to coronary heart disease.
The borough has the highest number of fast food outlets per population (1 for every 350 people).
The correlation is high, and the links are causal.
Professor Martin Caraher, one of the co-authors of the report, stated: “Transfats are particularly dangerous for coronary heart disease. And the big danger to a population is coronary heart disease.”
But the social aspect of fast food is important. While the health aspect will gain the headlines, it is understanding the reasons why people choose to eat at fast food restaurants that will help prevent further worsening this issue.
In Mile End and Whitechapel, from where much of the study was conducted, there is a high proportion of Bangladeshi and south-Asian immigrants. The culture, in terms of eating at familiar places run by family or friends, has emigrated with them.
The study showed that doner kebabs have the highest levels of transfats of the food analysed
“Traditionally fast food and street food are part of the culture,” said Professor Caraher. “We’re talking about a community who use fast foods for different reasons. Often the people are in low-paid and piecemeal work, so actually having fast food and takeaways is one way that they don’t have to spend time away from work.
“It’s very important because it does fill a cultural vacuum there.”
International restaurant franchises and chains are able to change their oil more regularly, based on their profits and turnover. Local or family-run small restaurants or small chains often cannot afford to do this, and so often rather than change their oil at the risk of reducing their profit margins, the oil stays in the friers for two or three, or five, days.
“We use vegetable oil,” said Ali Akkua, a family restaurant owner in London. “We change it every five days. Every week we change it, because we have to.”
Bringing multi-national firms in to improve the health of fast food restaurants at the expense of local business owners may sound like a good plan, but in itself produces another social issue. It’s unfeasible and already major restaurant chains have representation here, but the market is saturated with local businesses already.
Aside from eating the fast food, the health risks arising from the study included eating takeaways on top of a regular staple diet. ‘Unnecessary’ extra food is contributing to obesity levels as well as the coronary heart problems, but it is a culturally-linked lifestyle that will be unlikely to change.
“The problem we had in the east end of London is that there wasn’t anywhere to eat healthily, that was the point. If you were eating out, no matter where you went, you hadn’t got a healthy option” added Professor Caraher.
The four main outcomes highlighted by the study were to:
1) Make more information available about nutritional content of the food
2) Make healthy options more affordable
3) Make healthy options available and accessible for people eating out
4) Teach owners of the fast food restaurants about the health impacts their food may be having on their customers
Once again, everything in moderation was echoed by the study. Rather than ignore fast food altogether, the study urged people who eat fast food to search for the healthiest options available, and for suppliers and restaurant owners alike to improve the nutritional content, and reduce the fat content, especially transfats, of their produce.
Picture courtesy of: Yokohama National University
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