For three decades high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, and several other health issues have increased in the Delta. It has been said that we are in the middle of a “food desert,” a term which I have never fully understood the meaning of exactly. If obesity is everywhere you look here in the area, what is the actual meaning of a “food desert”? I don’t get it.
Toward that end, I have become interested in what Bobby Kennedy, Jr., is currently working on, which is to improve the ingredients of the American food supply, especially in our processed foods. Kennedy is the new Secretary of Health and Human Services Secretary for the U.S.
For background, Kennedy’s father was Robert F. Kennedy (RFK, Sr.) who was the U.S. Attorney General when his brother, John F. Kennedy, was President. Sadly, RFK, Sr. was assassinated in Los Angeles on June 6, 1968 while running for President. Not long before that, he had visited Cleveland, Greenville, Clarksdale and Winstonville and was so moved by the poverty, he felt the only way to solve this problem was to become President according to his late brother, Senator Ted Kennedy, who told me this over the phone. A year or so ago, my good friend Hiram Eastland and I took Kathleen Kennedy around to see the places her father visited while he was in Cleveland back in 1968.
Bobby Kennedy, Jr. is a lifelong Democrat who Trump named Secretary of Health and Human Services. Most of his Kennedy cousins came out against him being named to this post. In any event, one of Kennedy’s lifelong obsessions has been to improve the food supply in America.
“Something is poisoning the American people,” Kennedy said recently on one of the Sunday morning talk shows. “And, we know our changing food supplies have switched to highly chemical processed food. We have 10,000 ingredients in this country in our food and the Europeans only have 400.”
For years, Kennedy has blamed the major food manufacturing companies for many of the health problems we face in the U.S. According to him, a food company will sell something in the U.S. that is loaded with chemicals, yet they’ll sell the same food item in Canada that is not loaded with those same chemicals.
To put it bluntly, the U.S. food companies should simplify the ingredients of processed foods and become more on par with countries like Canada and Europe that have strict rules about the ingredients processed foods can or cannot contain.
I personally think Kennedy is on to something. Why do other countries make it a priority to ensure their food is healthy and not loaded with chemicals, yet the U.S. doesn’t seem to worry about this? It’s mostly all about the money. Adding preservatives allows food to have a longer shelf life. Food manufacturers worry about the short term gains and are not concerned what the long term affects will have on our citizens.
Can American food companies make a profit if they cut back on the preservatives? They say they cannot and, of course, these publicly traded companies make astronomical profits. Maybe if they cut back on the chemicals their profits would not be as great; however, they would still make a profit and by cutting out the bad ingredients it would be a huge help to Americans and their health.
The bottom line: cancer, diabetes, heart failure, and obesity rates continue to rise. Academics, scientists, and others say this is mostly due to our food intake.
I hope Secretary Kennedy is successful in his fight to find a solution to this problem that greatly affects Americans.
Let’s keep our fingers crossed.