Why is junk food bad for you?

My long time passion is food and its amazing ability to help deal with many medical conditions. That's why I'm known as The Food Physician. So, as the debate about obesity rages on both sides of the Atlantic, people are increasingly asking me, "Why is junk food bad for you?". After all, junk food is nice and cheap. In fact, the proportion of the income people spend on food has been falling for many years. That must surely be a good thing, so what's the problem?

The problem is, it's just too much of a good thing. If something sounds too good to be true, it usually is, so let's examine one reason why junk food is so cheap.

I don't deny junk food is very cheap, particularly when compared with organic food. But, if you've ever wondered is organic food better for you, let me give you an illustration.

You can pick up a frozen chicken for literally a fraction of what a free range, organic chicken would cost you. But everything in life comes with a price tag and your cheap meal is no exception.

This is why junk food is bad for you.

In order to produce at a far lower price than the naturally reared, organic chicken your dirt cheap chicken will likely have spent its short life of a few months from egg to supermarket, crammed in with thousands of other birds, in cramped conditions in sheds, fed specially prepared food, carefully designed to ensure the fastest weight gain in the shortest time. In addition, this food may even contain chicken meat -- recycled chickens which never made it to the convenience store. Your cheap chicken may well be an unwitting cannibal.

Such conditions are totally alien to a chicken's natural way of life, where they would be free to scratch about for natural food. But -- even if you ignore the cruel nature of all this -- you cannot escape the consequences on your own body. Because apart from the possibility of growth hormones being fed to your chicken, to maximize growth in the shortest possible time, the crowded conditions in which chickens have to be kept in order to get the unit cost down to the price level you demand, gives rise to all sorts of disease. To combat these, the chickens must be routinely dosed with antibiotics.

Certainly, the chicken producers don't want to do this, because their costs increase. But this is preferable to the whole of their livestock being wiped out, if disease takes hold. It's an ever present danger in those cramped conditions, where it would spread like wildfire.

So, that's just one answer to the question, "Why is junk food bad for you?" Another answer would to be the examine the life of the unfortunate cheap chicken's luckier organic cousin.

At the organic farm, the chicken's lifespan is longer anyway, because it's not fed growth hormones to fatten it as fast as possible. Not only is the organic chicken allowed to grow at its natural rate, it is also allowed to roam in the open air, rather than crammed into a shed with thousands of other birds. That means the danger of disease ripping through the whole flock is virtually nil. Any bird that did succumb to illness would be treated organically: by simply being removed from the healthy chickens.

So, because the organic chicken has been able to roam freely, rather than being restricted in its movements, the flesh you eat will be firmer, leaner and more flavorsome than the cheap chicken. Above all, it won't be laced with a cocktail of growth hormones and antibiotics.

I've seen many comments on discussion forums and elsewhere, where people consider organic food to be either a status symbol for people with more money than sense or a complete con.

Nothing could be further from the truth, and you really need to look at this from the other direction: rather than the organic item being an overpriced confidence trick for status seekers, you should view it as a fair price for decent food that will nourish, rather than harm, you.

So where does that leave the factory farmed chicken? We all know there's no such thing as a free lunch and the price you pay at the checkout is likely just the first payment.

After consuming this cheap food for a few years, you may be alarmed to discover all the money you saved buying cheap junk food is less than the doctor bills you now face.

So, if you are still wondering, "Why is junk food bad for you?", now you know.

Visit my Food Physician web site to discover more interesting info on the food you eat: Why_Is_Junk_Food_Bad_For_You