Sir Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical officer for England, has urged people to get cycling to fight obesity, saying that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do cycling is clearly incorrect.”

He also applauded what he described as the “imaginative” ways in which local authorities throughout the country sought to encourage active travel during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic, reports Mail Online.

Speaking yesterday at the annual conference of the Local Government Association and the Association of Directors of Public Health, Whitty, who became a household name through his appearances in government Covid-19 briefings on TV, said that levels of obesity had increased since the pandemic began.

According to data from NHS England, one in four children aged 10 were classified as obese during 2020, up from one in five the previous year, as were three in four adults.

Underlining that exercise is among the “most effective ways of improving health,” Whitty said that people should be encouraged to incorporate active travel, such as walking or cycling to work, into their daily lives to help combat obesity.

“I think there's often a feeling that it's going to be very hard work to get people to, for example, take up cycling,” he said.

“But if you went back to the ’50s and ’60s there were extremely high rates of people cycling for work as well as recreationally across the country.”

He said that data from the Department for Transport showed that in 2019, people in England cycled a combined total of 5 billion kilometres – less than a quarter of the 24 billion kilometres collectively ridden in 1949..

Whitty said that the data from 70 years ago demonstrated that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do cycling is clearly incorrect.”

Speaking about the increase in levels of obesity during the pandemic, he said that some aspects of public health have “trodden water or gone backwards over the last two year and we do need to quite seriously address them.”

He said: “One of the things that is the most effective ways of improving health – whether it's cardiovascular, cancer or mental health – is physical exercise.

“And active transport is a particularly important way to do this because it builds it into people's normal routines of daily life, rather than being seen as something that is separate.”

“What happened during the Covid crisis is that we saw many local authorities being extremely imaginative in the way that they made it easier for people to walk and cycle to work, to shops as well as recreationally – largely as a way of trying to get people off public transport where they could pass on or acquire Covid,” Whitty added.

“But what this demonstrates is what can be done and there's a lot that could be done in every area of the country.”

The role cycling can play in combatting obesity is well documented, with Chris Boardman, now the interim head of Active Travel England, having previously said: "Cycling is the miracle cure we discovered years ago.

"It treats obesity, a hundred inactivity-related diseases, air pollution and mental ill-health, and it helps the young and the elderly stay mobile.

“From HSBC UK-British Cycling research, we know that 14 million of us would like to cycle more often. So let’s make space on our roads and streets and give more people the chance to choose cycling.”

https://road.cc/content/news/get-cycling-fight-obesity-urges-sir-chris-whitty-291349

On 24/03/2022 01:49 pm, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:

> Sir Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical officer for England, has urged people to get fairy-cycling to fight obesity, saying that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do fairy-cycling is clearly incorrect.”

Has anyone sensible ever argued to the contrary?
>
> He also applauded what he described as the “imaginative” ways in which local authorities throughout the country sought to encourage active travel during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic, reports Mail Online.

No local authority in the UK had any business "encouraging" any sort of
travel. The UK was in lockdown.

Sensible people needed no second bidding to stay at home (except for
essential trips for supplies, getting to work where that work could not
be done at home, medical appointments, etc).

> Speaking yesterday at the annual conference of the Local Government Association and the Association of Directors of Public Health, Whitty, who became a household name through his appearances in government Covid-19 briefings on TV, said that levels of obesity had increased since the pandemic began.
>
> According to data from NHS England, one in four children aged 10 were classified as obese during 2020, up from one in five the previous year, as were three in four adults.
>
> Underlining that exercise is among the “most effective ways of improving health,” Whitty said that people should be encouraged to incorporate active travel, such as walking or fairy-cycling to work, into their daily lives to help combat obesity.
>
> “I think there's often a feeling that it's going to be very hard work to get people to, for example, take up fairy-cycling,” he said.

It depends.

It's easy to persuade the minority of fairy-cycling bigots of it. But
they didn't need persuasion. They were already convinced of their own
rights being superior to those of everyone else.

It's only normal people (ie, the vast majority) who are difficult to
persuade.

> “But if you went back to the ’50s and ’60s there were extremely high rates of people fairy-cycling for work as well as recreationally across the country.”

Yes, there were (though whether "extremely" is correct is a matter of
opinion).

There were lots of people who didn't have access to cars and vans, of
course. And loads who didn't have other luxuries like TV sets,
refrigerators, washing machines and dryers, hi-fi systems, central
heating, double-glazing, multiple changes of clothing and money for
variegated forms of leisure.

You aren't going to get the country back as it was in 1955.

Forget it.

> He said that data from the Department for Transport showed that in 2019, people in England fairy-cycled a combined total of 5 billion kilometres – less than a quarter of the 24 billion kilometres collectively ridden in 1949...

....when hardly anyone had a car and the country was still in deep
WW2-induced austerity (including food rationing*) under a Labour
government which revelled in that concept.

[* Food rationing had ceased in the German federal Republic the previous
year. of course, they didn't have a Labour government.]

> Whitty said that the data from 70 years ago demonstrated that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do fairy-cycling is clearly incorrect.”

Did he say that twice, as reported?

> Speaking about the increase in levels of obesity during the pandemic, he said that some aspects of public health have “trodden water or gone backwards over the last two year and we do need to quite seriously address them.”
>
> He said: “One of the things that is the most effective ways of improving health – whether it's cardiovascular, cancer or mental health – is physical exercise.
>
> “And active transport is a particularly important way to do this because it builds it into people's normal routines of daily life, rather than being seen as something that is separate.”
>
> “What happened during the Covid crisis is that we saw many local authorities being extremely imaginative in the way that they made it easier for people to walk and fairy-cycle to work, to shops as well as recreationally – largely as a way of trying to get people off public transport where they could pass on or acquire Covid,” Whitty added.

It would have been logical to scrap all bus- and fairy-cycle-lanes in
order to allow easy travel by the only mode which does not require close
contact with others and which protects against it - the motor car.

> “But what this demonstrates is what can be done and there's a lot that could be done in every area of the country.”
>
> The role fairy-cycling can play in combatting obesity is well documented, with Chris Boardman, now the interim head of Active Travel England, having previously said: "Fairy-cycling is the miracle cure we discovered years ago.

Is Boardman a doctor?

Who knew?
>
> "It treats obesity, a hundred inactivity-related diseases, air pollution and mental ill-health, and it helps the young and the elderly stay mobile.
>
> “From HSBC UK-British Fairy-cycling research, we know that 14 million of us would like to fairy-cycle more often. So let’s make space on our roads and streets and give more people the chance to choose fairy-cycling.”
>
> https://road.cc/content/news/get-cycling-fight-obesity-urges-sir-chris-whitty-291349
>

the little onion | 638 posts | 38 min ago
2 likeS

In the great Venn Diagram of life, I wonder what overlap there is between people who disagree with Whitty on cycling, and those who think he over-stated the dangers of COVID-19

On 24/03/2022 14:47, JNugent wrote:
> On 24/03/2022 01:49 pm, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:

>> Sir Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical officer for England, has urged people to get fairy-cycling to fight obesity, saying that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do fairy-cycling is clearly incorrect.”

> Has anyone sensible ever argued to the contrary?

>> He also applauded what he described as the “imaginative” ways in which local authorities throughout the country sought to encourage active travel during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic, reports Mail Online.

> No local authority in the UK had any business "encouraging" any sort of
> travel. The UK was in lockdown.
> Sensible people needed no second bidding to stay at home (except for
> essential trips for supplies, getting to work where that work could not
> be done at home, medical appointments, etc).

>> Speaking yesterday at the annual conference of the Local Government Association and the Association of Directors of Public Health, Whitty, who became a household name through his appearances in government Covid-19 briefings on TV, said that levels of obesity had increased since the pandemic began.

>> According to data from NHS England, one in four children aged 10 were classified as obese during 2020, up from one in five the previous year, as were three in four adults.

>> Underlining that exercise is among the “most effective ways of improving health,” Whitty said that people should be encouraged to incorporate active travel, such as walking or fairy-cycling to work, into their daily lives to help combat obesity.

>> “I think there's often a feeling that it's going to be very hard work to get people to, for example, take up fairy-cycling,” he said.

> It depends.

> It's easy to persuade the minority of fairy-cycling bigots of it. But
> they didn't need persuasion. They were already convinced of their own
> rights being superior to those of everyone else.

> It's only normal people (ie, the vast majority) who are difficult to
> persuade.

>> “But if you went back to the ’50s and ’60s there were extremely high rates of people fairy-cycling for work as well as recreationally across the country.”

> Yes, there were (though whether "extremely" is correct is a matter of
> opinion).

I'm not sure that is correct. I don't recall hordes of recreational
cycling in the early 50s - it was a cheap and simple method of weekday
transport when other methods were very expensive and buses were crowded.
People cycled because they had to, not because they wanted to.

> There were lots of people who didn't have access to cars and vans, of
> course. And loads who didn't have other luxuries like TV sets,
> refrigerators, washing machines and dryers, hi-fi systems, central
> heating, double-glazing, multiple changes of clothing and money for
> variegated forms of leisure.

> You aren't going to get the country back as it was in 1955.

> Forget it.

I'm sure there are groups, cyclists among them, that really do want to
to turn back the clock to the 1950s. Except for them, of course.

>> He said that data from the Department for Transport showed that in 2019, people in England fairy-cycled a combined total of 5 billion kilometres – less than a quarter of the 24 billion kilometres collectively ridden in 1949...

> ...when hardly anyone had a car and the country was still in deep
> WW2-induced austerity (including food rationing*) under a Labour
> government which revelled in that concept.

Even bread was rationed! During the war, when grain had to be shipped
in, it was not rationed!

> [* Food rationing had ceased in the German federal Republic the previous
> year. of course, they didn't have a Labour government.]

>> Whitty said that the data from 70 years ago demonstrated that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do fairy-cycling is clearly incorrect.”

> Did he say that twice, as reported?

>> Speaking about the increase in levels of obesity during the pandemic, he said that some aspects of public health have “trodden water or gone backwards over the last two year and we do need to quite seriously address them.”

>> He said: “One of the things that is the most effective ways of improving health – whether it's cardiovascular, cancer or mental health – is physical exercise.

I loathed sports at school, all that football, cricket, athletics, gym.
I bunked off as much as I could. The day I was 16 I threw my bicycle
away, fired up my motorcycle, and never looked back. I've lived longer
than any member of my family. most of whom succumbed to heart attacks or
cancer. I worked in a sector that was risky enough to require a full
annual medical. I didn't survive by buying a bicycle, I did it through
sensible eating. And I still have a motorcycle.

Whitty knows full well that he isn't going to change people's eating
habits, so he's gone along with the over-hyped but second-best choice
available.

>> “And active transport is a particularly important way to do this because it builds it into people's normal routines of daily life, rather than being seen as something that is separate.”
> It would have been logical to scrap all bus- and fairy-cycle-lanes in
> order to allow easy travel by the only mode which does not require close
> contact with others and which protects against it - the motor car.

>> “But what this demonstrates is what can be done and there's a lot that could be done in every area of the country.”

>> The role fairy-cycling can play in combatting obesity is well documented, with Chris Boardman, now the interim head of Active Travel England, having previously said: "Fairy-cycling is the miracle cure we discovered years ago.

> Is Boardman a doctor?

> Who knew?

>> "It treats obesity, a hundred inactivity-related diseases, air pollution and mental ill-health, and it helps the young and the elderly stay mobile.

>> “From HSBC UK-British Fairy-cycling research, we know that 14 million of us would like to fairy-cycle more often. So let’s make space on our roads and streets and give more people the chance to choose fairy-cycling.”

>> <https://road.cc/content/news/get-cycling-fight-obesity-urges-sir-chris-whitty-291349>

--
Spike

Rendel Harris replied to Sriracha | 2094 posts | 40 min ago
1 like

In my experience that's true, there just isn't a substitute for cutting down on calories, sadly. However, cycling is a brilliant secondary weight loss tool, not because of the amount of calories burned (after all it takes nearly 11 hours at 200 W to burn 1 kg of fat, and that's assuming one doesn't add any extra fuel for riding) but because as one starts to chuck the excess baggage climbing gets easier, you can go further and faster for the same effort, and (it probably shouldn't matter but it does) you start to look pretty good in cycling gear, and once you've got a taste for those things you really want to keep them and get more of them.

reply quote

Avatar
IanMSpencer replied to Sriracha | 326 posts | 40 min ago
2 likes

It depends, I think is the sensible answer.

Cycling over a reasonable distances is a really good excercise - outdoors, good for wellbeing, you do a low impact workout with intervals (hills and stops and starts).

I eat a mega-amount of calories - 4 sausages and a pile of mash awaits me for evening meal, plus banana and ice cream, I've had a couple of pints this afternoon (though not a consistent drinker) a nice steak sandwich because we missed the bacon butty cut off. Where are all those calories going?

OK, Whitty probably isn't thinking of a 50 mile ride, but basically using your body will use calories, and is part of balancing excess intake.

If you then get the cycling bug, you will soon shed weight without trying.

The other part of the formula though is getting rid of sugary and/or refined foods - ditch the Pringles - we have a decent snack of roasted monkey nuts (had the award from Sainsbury's for being the biggest buyer last year!), we do not stint on food, we just stay slim and healthy.

Trying to overcome the body's hunger signals is hard, so why not put those calories to use and enjoy eating enthusiastically?

reply quote

Avatar
Sriracha replied to IanMSpencer | 3009 posts | 6 min ago
1 like

IanMSpencer wrote:

Trying to overcome the body's hunger signals is hard, so why not put those calories to use and enjoy eating enthusiastically?

You've sort of explained my point there. Unless you do move the set point on your hunger signals (which is hard, like you say, and cycling does not do this for you) then you will, as you imply, simply compensate for the additional calorie burn by eating more enthusiastically, such that you maintain the status quo. Homeostasis. Your cardiovascular health will doubtless improve, but your weight?

I guess it's like trying to cool a heated room by opening the window to let some heat out. The heating system compensates to keep the room at the original temperature. To cool the room you have to move the dial on the thermostat.

On 24/03/2022 05:15 pm, Spike wrote:

> On 24/03/2022 14:47, JNugent wrote:
>> On 24/03/2022 01:49 pm, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:

>>> Sir Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical officer for England, has urged people to get fairy-cycling to fight obesity, saying that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do fairy-cycling is clearly incorrect.”

>> Has anyone sensible ever argued to the contrary?

>>> He also applauded what he described as the “imaginative” ways in which local authorities throughout the country sought to encourage active travel during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic, reports Mail Online.

>> No local authority in the UK had any business "encouraging" any sort of
>> travel. The UK was in lockdown.
>> Sensible people needed no second bidding to stay at home (except for
>> essential trips for supplies, getting to work where that work could not
>> be done at home, medical appointments, etc).

>>> Speaking yesterday at the annual conference of the Local Government Association and the Association of Directors of Public Health, Whitty, who became a household name through his appearances in government Covid-19 briefings on TV, said that levels of obesity had increased since the pandemic began.

>>> According to data from NHS England, one in four children aged 10 were classified as obese during 2020, up from one in five the previous year, as were three in four adults.

>>> Underlining that exercise is among the “most effective ways of improving health,” Whitty said that people should be encouraged to incorporate active travel, such as walking or fairy-cycling to work, into their daily lives to help combat obesity.

>>> “I think there's often a feeling that it's going to be very hard work to get people to, for example, take up fairy-cycling,” he said.

>> It depends.
>> It's easy to persuade the minority of fairy-cycling bigots of it. But
>> they didn't need persuasion. They were already convinced of their own
>> rights being superior to those of everyone else.
>> It's only normal people (ie, the vast majority) who are difficult to
>> persuade.

>>> “But if you went back to the ’50s and ’60s there were extremely high rates of people fairy-cycling for work as well as recreationally across the country.”

>> Yes, there were (though whether "extremely" is correct is a matter of
>> opinion).
>
> I'm not sure that is correct. I don't recall hordes of recreational
> cycling in the early 50s - it was a cheap and simple method of weekday
> transport when other methods were very expensive and buses were crowded.
> People cycled because they had to, not because they wanted to.

I accept that, though it isn't as different as some might suppose (ny
disagreement was with the ue of "extremely"). People who used
fairy-bikes to get to work and as part of their work (eg, the venerable
"man from the Pru") didn't tend to use the fairy-cycle as a means of
recreation. That was mainly children and adolescents. But there were a
lot of those in the days before mp3s, iPads and personal computers.

>> There were lots of people who didn't have access to cars and vans, of
>> course. And loads who didn't have other luxuries like TV sets,
>> refrigerators, washing machines and dryers, hi-fi systems, central
>> heating, double-glazing, multiple changes of clothing and money for
>> variegated forms of leisure.
>> You aren't going to get the country back as it was in 1955.
>> Forget it.

> I'm sure there are groups, cyclists among them, that really do want to
> to turn back the clock to the 1950s. Except for them, of course.

You are right. It is the only conclusion which can be reasonably drawn
from the facts.

To be honest, it's been going on since the second half of the 1960s,
once it was realised that the growth of affluence in general and
car-ownership in particular had implications for the basic or
organisation of society, especially in town-planning and architecture as
well as the reduced demand for public transport (something "the
authorities" seem to think they should have power to force onto people).

People like Colin Buchanan were clearly influenced by a desire to put
the bloody car-owning plebs back in their rightful place: on buses,
after a wait in the rain. And still, those people *wonder* why their
nostrums are rejected by the general public, who cannot be kidded as
easily as all that.

>>> He said that data from the Department for Transport showed that in 2019, people in England fairy-cycled a combined total of 5 billion kilometres – less than a quarter of the 24 billion kilometres collectively ridden in 1949...
>
>> ...when hardly anyone had a car and the country was still in deep
>> WW2-induced austerity (including food rationing*) under a Labour
>> government which revelled in that concept.
>
> Even bread was rationed! During the war, when grain had to be shipped
> in, it was not rationed!

I know.

It took a Labour government to cause a need for bread to be rationed
after WW2.

>> [* Food rationing had ceased in the German federal Republic the previous
>> year. of course, they didn't have a Labour government.]
>
>>> Whitty said that the data from 70 years ago demonstrated that “the idea that the UK is a country you can't actually do fairy-cycling is clearly incorrect.”
>
>> Did he say that twice, as reported?
>
>>> Speaking about the increase in levels of obesity during the pandemic, he said that some aspects of public health have “trodden water or gone backwards over the last two year and we do need to quite seriously address them.”
>
>>> He said: “One of the things that is the most effective ways of improving health – whether it's cardiovascular, cancer or mental health – is physical exercise.
>
> I loathed sports at school, all that football, cricket, athletics, gym.
> I bunked off as much as I could. The day I was 16 I threw my bicycle
> away, fired up my motorcycle, and never looked back. I've lived longer
> than any member of my family. most of whom succumbed to heart attacks or
> cancer. I worked in a sector that was risky enough to require a full
> annual medical. I didn't survive by buying a bicycle, I did it through
> sensible eating. And I still have a motorcycle.
>
> Whitty knows full well that he isn't going to change people's eating
> habits, so he's gone along with the over-hyped but second-best choice
> available.
>
I have nothing against authority in general attempting to improve public
health. I have nothing but praise for the way that the government (and
people like Professor Whitty) have managed to get us more or less
through the pandemic.

It's the knee-jerk "solutions" which jar, especially given that you
could have predicted it:

"The answer is 'use public transport of a fairy-bike rather than your
own car'. Now... what was your question going to be?".

>>> “And active transport is a particularly important way to do this because it builds it into people's normal routines of daily life, rather than being seen as something that is separate.”

>> It would have been logical to scrap all bus- and fairy-cycle-lanes in
>> order to allow easy travel by the only mode which does not require close
>> contact with others and which protects against it - the motor car.

>>> “But what this demonstrates is what can be done and there's a lot that could be done in every area of the country.”
>
>>> The role fairy-cycling can play in combatting obesity is well documented, with Chris Boardman, now the interim head of Active Travel England, having previously said: "Fairy-cycling is the miracle cure we discovered years ago.
>
>> Is Boardman a doctor?
>
>> Who knew?
>
>>> "It treats obesity, a hundred inactivity-related diseases, air pollution and mental ill-health, and it helps the young and the elderly stay mobile.
>
>>> “From HSBC UK-British Fairy-cycling research, we know that 14 million of us would like to fairy-cycle more often. So let’s make space on our roads and streets and give more people the chance to choose fairy-cycling.”
>
>>> <https://road.cc/content/news/get-cycling-fight-obesity-urges-sir-chris-whitty-291349>

From a US source:

Sir Chris Whitty urges people to get on their bikes.

People do not cycle as much as their grandparents and should consider getting on their bikes to boost their health, England’s chief medical officer has said.

Professor Sir Chris Whitty said that cycling rates had dropped significantly since the 1950s.

He praised efforts to promote walking and cycling during the Covid-19 pandemic but warned that the crisis had led to a severe impact on the levels of obesity across the country.

Sir Chris raised concerns that many aspects of public health had “either trodden water or gone backwards” over the last two years – including levels of obesity and also the impact the crisis had had on cancer screening.

“If we take a long-term view of obesity in the UK, it has got substantially worse over time,” Sir Chris told the Local Government Association and the Association of Directors of Public Health’s annual Public Health Conference.

“During the last two years, obesity particularly in children has got significantly worse.”

He added: “One of the things that is the most effective ways of improving health – whether it’s cardiovascular, cancer or mental health – is physical exercise.

“And active transport is a particularly important way to do this because it builds it into people’s normal routines of daily life, rather than being seen as something that is separate.

“I think there’s often a feeling that it’s going to be very hard work to get people to, for example, take up cycling (but) if you went back to the ’50s and ’60s there were extremely high rates of people cycling for work as well as recreationally across the country and then they fell away.

“There has been a slight increase over time but we are nowhere near the rates which had been seen in our grandparents’ generation as a matter of routine, but it does demonstrate that the idea that the UK is a country you can’t actually do cycling is clearly incorrect.”

He pointed to data from the Health Foundation which showed that increasing the amount of walking or cycling across England could lead to a significant reduction in premature deaths.

Sir Chris added: “What happened during the Covid crisis is that we saw many local authorities being extremely imaginative in the way that they made it easier for people to walk and cycle to work, to shops as well as recreationally – largely as a way of trying to get people off public transport where they could pass on or acquire Covid.

“But what this demonstrates is what can be done and there’s a lot that could be done in every area of the country.”

He said that some public health issues became temporarily better during the crisis, such as air pollution levels.
Sir Chris said that he was planning to address air pollution in his annual report later in the year, but refused to draw links between the car and tobacco industries.

He said: “People need to get around, and the car industry is an important part of that, whereas no-one needs to smoke and the cigarette industry essentially makes profits by killing its fellow citizens.

“The correct number of cigarettes in the UK is zero. And the correct number of cars in the UK is definitely not zero.”

Sir Chris also raised concerns about a dip in screening for diseases during the pandemic.

“Screening coverage has dropped for many of the important diseases,” he said.

“And the risk of this is that over the next two to three years we will be facing a situation where people will be presenting with breast cancer, with cervical cancer for example at a later stage than they previously would have done and as we all know with cancers, early diagnosis leads to much better outcomes and much more non-invasive treatments for people.”

https://www.aol.com

On 24/03/2022 17:41, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:

> Sir Chris Whitty urges people to get on their bikes.

> People do not cycle as much as their grandparents and should consider getting on their bikes to boost their health, England’s chief medical officer has said.

> Professor Sir Chris Whitty said that cycling rates had dropped significantly since the 1950s.

What Whitty failed to mention is that in high-cycling 1950, average life
spans were 66 for men and 72 for women. As cycling declined, people
became healthier and lived longer, and with today's low level of
cycling, people now live to 79 for men and 83 for women.

The data is clear: if you want to live, stay off bicycles.

--
Spike

eburtthebike | 3008 posts | 10 hours ago
4 likes

For all those people doubting the efficacy of cycling as a weight reducing measure:

"The role cycling can play in combatting obesity is well documented, with Chris Boardman, now the interim head of Active Travel England, having previously said: "Cycling is the miracle cure we discovered years ago."

And I recall the statement by NICE about how achieiving the government's cycling targets was the best way of tackling the obesity crisis.

But to be fair, this is another failure by the media, which is obsessed by food and totally refuses to acknowledge the role of exercise, especially active travel, in improving health and controlling weight. For example, there was a massive push by Eton-educated chef Henry Dimbleby (Eton, food and a Dimbleby, the BBC's producers' excitement was trickling down their legs) which was heavily covered by the media. He stated categorically many times that it was impossible to lose weight by exercising, which despite being untrue and disproved, was never challenged.

There is no doubt that exercise is at least as important as diet, but the UK media focusses 99% on food.

EDIT; A quick search found many studies that confirmed cycling reduces weight:

"Daily travel by bike leads to the lowest BMI, according to a study of seven European cities, suggesting cities should promote active commutes." https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/187087/promoting-cycling-cities-tackle-o... (link is external)

‘Cycling is our best hope against obesity’ https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/latest-news/cycling-is-our-best-hope-... (link is external)

On 25/03/2022 11:08, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:

> here is no doubt that exercise is at least as important as diet

And who claims this?

--
Spike

IanMSpencer replied to Sriracha | 328 posts | 13 hours ago
4 likes
My wife has lost weight by eating more and exercising more.

My personal theory is that, combined with a sensible mix of food, which is solid wholesome food, not faddy diet and low fat high sugar commercial weight control type products, butter, eggs, meat, potatoes, much like is ready 30 years ago you eat a satisfying meal. You then respond to that by storing the calories or using them. My wife doesn't cycle but she does walk 40+ miles a week. That doesn't mean our appetites get bigger as we are satisfied after a meal then don't snack, just an occasional limited quantity of monkey nuts some evenings.

She eats more than she used to and weighs less. The only significant restriction we have is that we've cut down on alcohol. Not tea-total by a long shot, but no longer comfort drinking on a regular basis.

I don't think appetite necessarily matches energy usage.

On 25/03/2022 08:53 am, Spike wrote:
> On 24/03/2022 17:41, swldx...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>> Sir Chris Whitty urges people to get on their bikes.
>
>> People do not cycle as much as their grandparents and should consider getting on their bikes to boost their health, England’s chief medical officer has said.
>
>> Professor Sir Chris Whitty said that cycling rates had dropped significantly since the 1950s.
>
> What Whitty failed to mention is that in high-cycling 1950, average life
> spans were 66 for men and 72 for women. As cycling declined, people
> became healthier and lived longer, and with today's low level of
> cycling, people now live to 79 for men and 83 for women.
>
> The data is clear: if you want to live, stay off bicycles.

:-)

a1white replied to David Quackeroo | 189 posts | 21 hours ago
10 likes
David Quackeroo wrote:

I...and also think he systematically over-stated the danger of COVID... Only someone who wasn't paying attention could think he didn't.

By your reckoning, I obviously wasn't paying attention, but I fully agree with him on the danger of Covid back it's peak (as probably do the 100,000's of families and friends who lost loved ones).

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