Question: is there anything that is bad for you that nobody knows about but still uses

Alison Whitaker answered on 21 Jun 2015:

I am definitely sure there is! Although I don’t think that nobody knows about these things, just that some things are so entrenched in our lives, we continue doing them even though they might be really bad for us.

It wasn’t long ago that heroin was legal, and tea was illegal. Some of our definitions of bad is based on the laws we have too (but some are actually bad!).

A big risk to our health long-term, more so than drinking and smoking, is actually sitting around for longer than half an hour at a time. When our bodies are still (but we are awake – this doesn’t happen when we sleep) our bodies start to switch off and go in to a bit of a slow mode (ever felt really sluggish if you’ve watched TV all day?). This contributes to long term health conditions such as type two diabetes.

I also think a massive ‘bad thing’ is processed food. The chemicals in our food made in factories are really bad. Although we like to think bad chemicals would never be allowed in our food, that isn’t true at all. The way foods are processed by law can use toxic chemicals but are not ‘counted’ as an ingredient because they are for ‘processing’ only.

Lots of people know about these things, but if people become sicker with diseases that don’t kill you, and spend money on factory food rather than cooking at home, then big companies can make more money.

I’m sure there are lots of things that we don’t think about as bad too.

I should also say that I do spend time sitting around, and I don’t always cook all my own food, but I think being aware of these things help us make choices about our lives. 🙂