Hospitals can be dangerous places. Two things happen to everyone admitted to hospital for more than a few hours—they are put to bed and are fed. Over half a century ago Richard Asher highlighted the obsession hospitals have with beds and the dangers of being confined to bed (BMJ 1947; doi: 10.1136/bmj.2.4536.967). Asher’s description of […]
Tag: food
Richard Smith: More than a food bank
Food banks in the United States are busy. The Community Food Bank of Southern Arizona, which I visited last week as part of the University of Arizona’s conference on global health leadership, is helping more than 225 500 people every month. The numbers have grown dramatically with the recession. Some 16% of people in Southern […]
Richard Smith: A modest proposal to supermarkets
In healthcare we are much concerned about privacy, but Sainsbury’s, the supermarket chain, knows how much toilet paper I’ve bought in the past 20 years, how many chocolate éclairs I eat a month, that I love smoked fish, whether I eat white or brown bread, and much more. It could probably do a better job […]
David Payne: ugly fruit
An apple farmer in Conservative MP Laura Sandy’s Kent constituency gets just £80 a tonne for bruised and mis-shapen fruit rejected by the supermarkets. When she visits local schools and asks how many children are planning a career in food science and production, teaching staff say they don’t want them picking beans out in the […]