Do You Still Eat Healthy?

By Ethan C. Glasgow

Since the Stone Age, we have been trying our best to make our foods taste better so we can enjoy our food and still keep its nutritional value.

In the past century, we have chosen money over health and paid the price. Junk food tends to be cheaper than food that is good for us. In the Caribbean, we have tasty, fresh and healthy foods, but foreigners are coming in and changing our tasty, fresh and healthy diet. Are we still a region which makes food delicious and nutritious or are we becoming a region which eats tasty but insalubrious food? The real question is do we still eat healthy?

In the Caribbean, we are importing unhealthy foods from the United States and other countries. I must tell you these foods are scrumptious. Some may include: Pretzels, gummy bears, potato chips- (remember who invented them from my previous article?) salted crackers, other sweets and junk food.

Now after that list, you must be feeling hungry, I certainly am. One bag of pretzels may not harm you but 17 packets at one sitting would significantly damage your health. When you have all that fat in your system at once, the body stores it under your skin, the more junk you eat the more obese you can get.

Now I am certain that you have heard all of this before when your grandma catches you eating a large bag of potato chips but this is not the only reason it impacts your life. Sometimes the “healthy foods” do not taste as good as junk food and so you would not want to eat it.

Today, I am not allowed to have red meat. This includes beef, lamb, ham, hot dogs etc. You are wondering why I am not allowed to eat something that gives you iron, phosphorus and protein. Well in the 1990s, there was a disease going round called Mad-cow disease (by the way this does not mean that you act like a mad cow). It was caused by unsanitary confinement of food in meat factories. Because of this, people got salmonella and other diseases. My family was so concerned about this, that they stopped eating red meat, way before I was born. Now we rarely ever have red meat.

We should not import foods from other countries that are bad for our health. Try not to buy too many pretzels and try your best to keep away from junk food; that way we can stay a healthy Caribbean region.

Ethan Carlton Glasgow is a student at St. Mary’s College. He is in Form I. He enjoys Science, History, cricket and golf. He prefers fruits and vegetables to junk food.