The Asian Independent - January 2019

www.theasianindependent.co.uk
PHE launches new
Change4Life campaign to help
families cut back on sugar.
Children have already
exceeded the maximum recommended
sugar intake for an 18
year old by the time they reach
their tenth birthday, according
to Public Health England
(PHE). This is based on their
total sugar consumption from
the age of 2.
This figure comes as a new
Change4Life campaign launches
today (2 January 2019), supporting
families to cut back on
sugar and to help tackle growing
rates of childhood obesity.
While children’s sugar
intakes have declined slightly
in recent years, they are still
consuming around 8 excess
sugar cubes each day, equivalent
to around 2,800 excess
sugar cubes per year.
To help parents manage this,
Change4Life is encouraging
them to ‘Make a swap when
you next shop’. Making simple
everyday swaps can reduce
children’s sugar intake from
some products (yoghurts,
drinks and breakfast cereals) by
half – while giving them
healthier versions of the foods
and drinks they enjoy.
Parents can try swapping:
a higher-sugar yoghurt (for
example split-pot) for a lower
sugar one, to halve their sugar
intake from 6 cubes of sugar
UNITED KINGDOM
10 year olds in the UK have
consumed 18 years’ worth of sugar
to 3
a sugary juice drink for a noadded
sugar juice drink, to cut
back from 2 cubes to half a
cube
a higher-sugar breakfast
cereal (such as a frosted or
chocolate cereal) for a lower
sugar cereal, to cut back from 3
cubes to half a cube per bowl
While some foods and
drinks remain high in sugar,
many companies have reformulated
products such as
yoghurts, breakfast cereals and
juice drinks, meaning these
swaps are a good place for families
to start.
Making these swaps every
day could remove around 2,500
sugar cubes per year from a
child’s diet, but swapping
chocolate, puddings, sweets,
cakes and pastries for healthier
options such as malt loaf,
sugar-free jellies, lower-sugar
custards and rice puddings
would reduce their intake even
more.
Severe obesity in 10 to 11
year olds has now reached an
all-time high. Overweight or
obese children are more likely
to be overweight or obese as
adults, increasing their risk of
heart disease and some cancers,
while more young people than
ever are developing Type 2 diabetes.
Excess sugar can also
lead to painful tooth decay, bullying
and low self-esteem in
childhood.
Dr Alison Tedstone, Chief
Nutritionist at PHE, said:
Children are consuming too
much sugar, but parents can
take action now to prevent this
building up over the years.
To make this easier for busy
families, Change4Life is offering
a straightforward solution –
by making simple swaps each
day, children can have healthier
versions of everyday foods and
drinks, while significantly
reducing their sugar intake.
Families are encouraged to
look for the Change4Life
‘Good Choice’ badge in shops,
download the free Food
Scanner app or search
Change4Life to help them find
lower sugar options.
Popular brands – including
Nestlé Shredded Wheat, Nestlé
January 2019
3
Low Sugar Oat Cheerios, Petits
Filous and Soreen (malt loaf) –
will display the ‘Good Choice’
badge online, in-store and
throughout their advertising, to
help parents find healthier
options.
Customers can also find
healthier options in supporting
supermarkets including Asda
and Aldi, as well as in Londis
and Budgens convenience
stores.
With a third of children leaving
primary school overweight
or obese, tackling obesity
requires wider action and is not
just limited to individual efforts
from parents. PHE is working
with the food industry to
remove 20% of sugar from the
products contributing the most
to children’s sugar intakes by
2020.
In May 2018, PHE published
progress against the
first-year sugar reductionambition
of 5%, which showed an
average 2% reduction in sugar
across categories for retailers
and manufacturers.
While breakfast cereals and
yoghurts and fromage frais
were among the categories
meeting or exceeding the 5%
ambition, some products in
these categories are still high in
sugar – this is why
Change4Life is making it easier
for parents to find lowersugar
options.
The Public Relation Interview of Narendra Modi
Those of you who are fond of
Narendra Modi’s classes must have
found that he has mellowed down a lot.
The one way communication that he is
habitual of, have not worked yet he is
not ready to face the grilling questions
about his government’s track record on
governance issue. It is not merely the
questions of notebandi or GST, there
are wider issues of lumpen being
appointed as vice chancellors of the
universities, curriculum changes, scholarships
being denied to SC-ST-OBC
students, the goondaism of the
Hindutva affliiated groups and so on.
Normally, Modi would not allow a
journalist to sit along with him or photographed
like that and it has become a
norm now when the gap between the
interviewer and Narendra Modi is
clearly visible. This is a clear signal to
them that ‘Bhai tum patrakar ho, apnee
aukat me raho, dont cross the line’. And
perhaps it is this basis that interviewer
are selected. Though, it is a normal procedure
these days to ask for a set of
questionnaire in advance so that the
persons in high positions speak with
authenticity but now that is being
replaced by fake data. Now, impromptu
press conferences too are not sure
whether they are planned or fixed but
perhaps we might see that where a few
of the journalists who have been invited
for Modi’s class, would be invited.
If you see the questions, the interviewer
is already on the defensive. She
is finding it difficult to question him. ‘
you have done so much good work for
women, you have shown your concern
for women’s rights but why not the
same about Sabarimala.’ How are
Sabarimala issue and Triple Talaq bill
ever related to. The issue could have
been, Mr Prime Minister, we appreciate
your concern for Muslim women but for
the same crime Hindu men are not punished.
Is there going to be any change in
the Hindu laws where Hindu men too
will be criminalised for divorcing their
wives or those who do not even divorce
and just leave them. The number of
women left in India, according to a survey,
among the Hindus is far higher to
what is there among the Muslims. There
are many such reports available. Smita
Prakash could have asked the Prime
Minister, whether he would also bring a
law to protect Hindu
woman. Obviously, the
bhakts have no questions
to ask to him about
his foreign policy failures,
and the blunder that this government
is playing in Jammu and Kashmir,
what happened to ‘historical’ Naga
accord that this government signed in
the beginning and details of which
remain secret till date, the issue of
By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
social and human rights activist
Kartarpur Saheb, the issue of our relationship
with our friendly neighbors like
Nepal and Srilanka. Obviously, the
issue of Muslims and their isolation
does not come on the agenda of the
these journalists.
The farce that we are fast becoming
is this that we are afraid of asking questions.
And we have also
legitimised the state effort
to create an atmosphere of
suspicion against one community
which is the second
biggest majority of India.
Can you deny a community whose history
and track-record of building this
nation is over 700 years old. How can a
state allow and encourage the goons to
terrorise a community every now and
then. And these goons then protected by
the police and administration. The cow
campaign has finished farmers particularly
the marginalised one. When did
we see a government which was at war
against its own people.
And how these devotees have
changed the narratives.
Now, Modi and all others
are speaking that ‘courts’
are not fast-tracking the
issue. Basically, all in the
media and the administration
want the Supreme
Court to not only give a
judgement soonest possible
but give a judgement
in their favor. This is the
pressure tactics that give us a judgement
to build temple there so that we
can go to people with much louder
noise. Will Modi and his PR agencies
accept the Supreme Court Judgement if
it goes against them ?
This the irony of India. Worldover,
we say that political class is always like
that which use public sentiments and it
is the media, the intellectuals who
speak up for the rights of the people,
minorities and the marginalised and
play role of real opposition along with
the opposition. In India, opposition is
dumb and have not much difference
with this government except for some
minor issues and the corporate media
has become the PR agencies of the government
and today they pose the
biggest threat to our democracy.
Modi’s interview has given another
opportunity for the corrupt media to kill
the big story from Kerala where women
came out of their homes and work to
make a huge 620 kilometer chains, an
unprecedented event in the history of
India. There was a huge congregation at
Bhima Koregaon where lakhs of people
turned up despite the government of
Maharashtra’s effort to stop them and
yet it did not become the main news.
Kudos to each one of them but then the
Brahmin Bania media knows how to
kill stories of resistance because the
Kerala’s historical event or massive
gatherings at Bhima-Koregaon was a
complete rejection of the Sangh
Parivar’s hate agenda in those states.
The corrupt media would not show
these stories though it cant ignore the
same. As election approaches, we will
see more such fake-interviews which
will take your prime time and each
channel will spend hours and hours
debating them. It is nothing but well
planned exercise to kill other important
news and protests.
We hope people will remain vigilant
against the paid vigilante on our TV
channels and expose them.