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BREAKFAST BREAKTHROUGH
812 Neither could he be expected to decline beriberi in Cingalese, nor quinine in Quichuan, nor tsutsugamushi in Japanese, nor loa-loa and ouabain and kwashiorkor and dozens of others in their appropriate African tongues, nor, for that matter, malaria, jaagsiekte and Fleckmilz: which is the point that I wanted to make when I first rashly mentioned the orang-outang. Because fifty years ago most educated people knew a lot of Latin and at least some Greek, we persist in a pedantic adhesion to accuracy in those tongues which we cannot hope to maintain in all the others. There is no logical or universal solution short of allowing that any word that has been adopted into the English language-passage beyond the stage of needing .quotes, italics, or bracketed translation could be accepted s adoption-ought as normal practice to be treated grammatically as an English word. We need not be over-pedantic about this. It is, after all, a relatively innocent indulgence that allows us to flaunt our familiarity with carcinomata, flagella, bullse, and the like. But let us not think the worse of anyone who treats such
words
as
English. B. ELL.
Points of View
are prepared 1 to suffer serious damage to kidneys." your Perhaps fish would be safer ? Fish? You must be singularly ill-informed. Owing to poisonous effluents, both sea and river fish are now contaminated with mercury and arsenic2 and may poison you. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration suggest that fish can be eaten, but not more than once a week, and provided you avoid tuna-fish and sword-fish altogether." Fresh fruit is surely all right ? Only if you wash it very thoroughly before eating. It has been demonstrated that birds have dropped dead after pecking at fruit which had been sprayed with insecticides." Well, maybe the safest thing would be to give up eating anything at breakfast, and settle for a good strong
have, unless you
"
" "
"
"
"
"
cup of coffee ?
"
"
Ah, that’s where you are dangerously wrong. It has been shown that anyone who drinks one cup of coffee a day is running an increased risk of cancer of the bladder.3 Those who drink more incur, of course, a greater risk. Coffee, my dear sir, is definitely out." At this point Everyman tried He should have known better. "
a wan
little joke.
I suppose I’d come to no harm if I just had a glass of and lemon-juice for my breakfast ? " That depends on whether the water is soft or hard."
water "
BREAKFAST BREAKTHROUGH ALAN MCGLASHAN
Everyman
felt
on
solid
ground
at
last.
"
We’re all right there, doctor. We have a water-softener." More fool you. Don’t you read the papers ? A Medical Research Council unit has just issued a reportstrongly supporting the theory that the use of soft water is related to the increase of coronary deaths. Scrap your softener, man, scrap your softener. It may be a killer." "
curious thing, this ever-increasing care and protection that medical research now devotes to our faulty dietary. Scientists in all parts of the world are daily discovering unsuspected dangers in our diet. One gets the feeling that, like an anxious mother with her only child, they will not rest till every conceivable risk has been eliminated. We should surely be grateful for all this solicitude-or should we ? For a good many years medical research was content with occasional warnings to the public, of which few took any notice: that children should not eat sweets, that white bread was not nutritious, that refined IT is
a
sugar was upsetting to the metabolism, and so on. To little coteries of health and food cranks here and
there these were tidings of great joy. But the rest of us carried on much as before, on the light-hearted assumption that a little of what you fancy does you
good. Those careless days are over. The doctors now strike a sterner and more menacing note. That valuable but dangerous new toy, the computer, has enormously extended the scope of medical research, and statistics of unprecedented range and disquieting import are pouring down upon us. Death, in sudden or insidious forms, lies hidden, it would seem, in the Take breakfast, for most everyday articles of diet. between a member of the public A dialogue example. and a medical-research expert on what we should eat for breakfast would go something like this:
" Well, doctor, what about cereals with milk and sugar, followed by toast and marmalade ? " " But surely you know these things are fattening, and that to be overweight is to be on the road to early death ? " " Bacon and eggs, then ? " What, dailyHeavens, no. Do you want to raise your cholesterol level, which carries the statistically proved risk of a coronary heart attack ? And by the way, look out you don’t use too much Worcester sauce with whatever you do
Everyman, slightly unnerved by this conversation, reaches out for a cigarette but remembers just in time that this is the royal road to lung cancer, bronchitis, and heart-disease. Poor
Yes, yes. Scientific research must not be shackled. If these things are dangerous to health we had better be told so. Agreed, agreed. But should not someone tell these eager beavers of researchers that the atmosphere of anxiety and misgiving that is being created about almost everything that we put into our mouths has its own profound effect upon our health ? It is strange that we hear so little about the effects of anxiety. For in the long run it is anxiety-not tobacco or coffee or soft water-that is the hidden destroyer in the contemporary world. Anxiety treacherously opens the door to every kind of accident and physical disease, cripples efficiency, murders happiness. In wartime, it was an indictable offence to " spread alarm and despondency "-even if the facts were true. It was recognised then that human survival depended It still does. on morale. I do not know the answer to this dilemma; but I do know that medical researchers should open their eyes to the danger of activating anxiety, this insidious cancer of the human mind, this grey enemy of life, and should devote at least a part of their research to the aim of reducing rather than increasing it. REFERENCES 1. Br. med. J. July 3, 1971, p. 6. 2. Lancet, 1971, i, 1348. 3. Cole P. ibid. p. 1335. 4. Crawford, M., Gardner, M. J.,
p. 327.
Morris, J. N. ibid. Aug. 14, 1971,
words
as
English. B. ELL.
Points of View
are prepared 1 to suffer serious damage to kidneys." your Perhaps fish would be safer ? Fish? You must be singularly ill-informed. Owing to poisonous effluents, both sea and river fish are now contaminated with mercury and arsenic2 and may poison you. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration suggest that fish can be eaten, but not more than once a week, and provided you avoid tuna-fish and sword-fish altogether." Fresh fruit is surely all right ? Only if you wash it very thoroughly before eating. It has been demonstrated that birds have dropped dead after pecking at fruit which had been sprayed with insecticides." Well, maybe the safest thing would be to give up eating anything at breakfast, and settle for a good strong
have, unless you
"
" "
"
"
"
"
cup of coffee ?
"
"
Ah, that’s where you are dangerously wrong. It has been shown that anyone who drinks one cup of coffee a day is running an increased risk of cancer of the bladder.3 Those who drink more incur, of course, a greater risk. Coffee, my dear sir, is definitely out." At this point Everyman tried He should have known better. "
a wan
little joke.
I suppose I’d come to no harm if I just had a glass of and lemon-juice for my breakfast ? " That depends on whether the water is soft or hard."
water "
BREAKFAST BREAKTHROUGH ALAN MCGLASHAN
Everyman
felt
on
solid
ground
at
last.
"
We’re all right there, doctor. We have a water-softener." More fool you. Don’t you read the papers ? A Medical Research Council unit has just issued a reportstrongly supporting the theory that the use of soft water is related to the increase of coronary deaths. Scrap your softener, man, scrap your softener. It may be a killer." "
curious thing, this ever-increasing care and protection that medical research now devotes to our faulty dietary. Scientists in all parts of the world are daily discovering unsuspected dangers in our diet. One gets the feeling that, like an anxious mother with her only child, they will not rest till every conceivable risk has been eliminated. We should surely be grateful for all this solicitude-or should we ? For a good many years medical research was content with occasional warnings to the public, of which few took any notice: that children should not eat sweets, that white bread was not nutritious, that refined IT is
a
sugar was upsetting to the metabolism, and so on. To little coteries of health and food cranks here and
there these were tidings of great joy. But the rest of us carried on much as before, on the light-hearted assumption that a little of what you fancy does you
good. Those careless days are over. The doctors now strike a sterner and more menacing note. That valuable but dangerous new toy, the computer, has enormously extended the scope of medical research, and statistics of unprecedented range and disquieting import are pouring down upon us. Death, in sudden or insidious forms, lies hidden, it would seem, in the Take breakfast, for most everyday articles of diet. between a member of the public A dialogue example. and a medical-research expert on what we should eat for breakfast would go something like this:
" Well, doctor, what about cereals with milk and sugar, followed by toast and marmalade ? " " But surely you know these things are fattening, and that to be overweight is to be on the road to early death ? " " Bacon and eggs, then ? " What, dailyHeavens, no. Do you want to raise your cholesterol level, which carries the statistically proved risk of a coronary heart attack ? And by the way, look out you don’t use too much Worcester sauce with whatever you do
Everyman, slightly unnerved by this conversation, reaches out for a cigarette but remembers just in time that this is the royal road to lung cancer, bronchitis, and heart-disease. Poor
Yes, yes. Scientific research must not be shackled. If these things are dangerous to health we had better be told so. Agreed, agreed. But should not someone tell these eager beavers of researchers that the atmosphere of anxiety and misgiving that is being created about almost everything that we put into our mouths has its own profound effect upon our health ? It is strange that we hear so little about the effects of anxiety. For in the long run it is anxiety-not tobacco or coffee or soft water-that is the hidden destroyer in the contemporary world. Anxiety treacherously opens the door to every kind of accident and physical disease, cripples efficiency, murders happiness. In wartime, it was an indictable offence to " spread alarm and despondency "-even if the facts were true. It was recognised then that human survival depended It still does. on morale. I do not know the answer to this dilemma; but I do know that medical researchers should open their eyes to the danger of activating anxiety, this insidious cancer of the human mind, this grey enemy of life, and should devote at least a part of their research to the aim of reducing rather than increasing it. REFERENCES 1. Br. med. J. July 3, 1971, p. 6. 2. Lancet, 1971, i, 1348. 3. Cole P. ibid. p. 1335. 4. Crawford, M., Gardner, M. J.,
p. 327.
Morris, J. N. ibid. Aug. 14, 1971,