In this day and age, the diets of most children are usually atrocious beacuse many of them eat junk food regularly. The fast food industry's food is destroying many young people's health. It's a very serious issue and parents need to know just how serious it really is. Now the diets of many adults are also affected because even they frequent the fast food restaurants too often. It is not unusual for parents to pick up fast food and bring it home for the evening meal.

Last year Americans spent about $115 billion on fast food, more than on higher education, personal computers or new cars. Since the economy has worsened it has been a real boom for the fast food industry, John Barney, president of Crown Point based Barney Enterprises, said as the economy plummeted, fast food restaurants have seen rising sales.

Sales at his four Northwest Indiana Wendy's restaurants were up 4.5 percent during 2008. McDonald's saw its U.S. sales increase 5 percent in 2008 compared to the previous year. Burger King saw it's revenues for the second quarter of 2009 increase 3 percent compared to $613 million in the comparable period of fiscal 2008.

Now not only is the fast food itself a real hazard to a person's healthy but the soft drinks they sell is also a grave concern too. For every soft drink or sugar-sweetened beverage a child drinks everyday, their obesity risk appears to jump 60%. About 65% of adolescent girls and 74% of adolescent boys consume soft drinks daily.

A group of organizations from 20 different countries has issued a public call for soft drinks giants like the Coca-Cola Company and PepsiCo to halt all marketing of their product to children. In addition, the companies have been asked to prominently label the front of all beverage products with the number of calories per serving, and to limit their sponsorship of sports and health programs to blind trusts over-seen by governments.

Parents, listen to this rather simple suggestion. There is absolutely no reason your kids should be drinking soda. They absolutely should be drinking none, period. The elimination of soda pop is one of the most crucial factors in the health problems people suffer. The average girl has one ounce of pure sugar and a boy has two ounces of pure sugar everyday from soda. That is nearly 50 pounds of sugar every year just from soda, and this is "average". Some kids will even be drinking more than this.

You see what happens here is if kids drink all that sugar the appetite is relatively suppressed for nourishing foods like vegetables and that results in nutritional deficiencies. This is only part of the damage all that sugar can do. Now if you say, "But my kids drink diet soda." So you think that's safer? Well let me tell you this, that is likely far worse. Why? Because diet drinks contain "aspartame". If that's not familiar to you, it's a chemical sweeter, and it can eventually be deadly. (I'm not kidding.)

This is not the only thing to be concerned about fast food and drink. A food product enhancer is another culprit to void like the plague. It's called MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) and its sole reason is to enhance the flavor of any food. Several of McDonald's recipes include MSG in their products; in particular their French Fries. Let me tell you why you should be concerned. Studies have indicated that MSG can cause severe allergies and even brain damage. Recently there was a Japanese researcher suggested that consuming too much of MSG could make you go blind.

So parents, you not only need to monitor your children's diet but also you own as well. Even many processed foods contain this dangerous product too. Isn't it remarkable that the FDA who is supposed to regulate our food and drink industry seems to turn their heads and forgets about what their job really is? That's protecting our lives. You wouldn't think that they believe  industry profits are more important than the nation's health, would you? I know what I believe and I get real disgusted when I don't think government acts in our behalf.

To your good health,

Sonny Julius

Sonnyj@TheSunnySenior.com

www.AHealthyLifeForSure.com