Hello. I have two interesting newspaper articles to tell you about today, both of them are from the
Sunday Times on the 12th of July, and both have the backdrop of the Coronavirus pandemic. The
first one is about helping obese people to lose weight, and the second one is about anxiety as
lockdown restrictions ease. India Knight wrote the first article, and it was in the Comments section
of the Sunday Times. She entitled it 'To Beat Obesity, Target Minds, not Stomachs'. The top
heading was 'We want a thinner Britain, especially in Covid Times, but Shaming Won't Work'. India
Knight argued that people who were overweight will not be helped to lose weight by anti-obesity
drives by the Government, such as banning junk food promotion at supermarkets or taking away
sweets from the tills, and that a public campaign telling fat people to lose weight will make them
ashamed, reminding them that they have a problem. She went on to say that it is shame that keeps
people fat, and that being fat is as much in the head as in the body. She said that in theory
people know how to lose weight, but it is not as easy as that - that's totally belittling their
suffering in the situation. She stated the issues with weight, either too much or too little, needed
to be managed with a psychological approach. India went on to say that eating is a cure
for all sorts of misery for different people, and that people eat when they're sad, lonely, worried,
scared and angry, as well as when they're happy, and it's like eating one's emotions. She said
that other overweight people feel small and lost inside and want to feel bigger and more powerful.
She said that sometimes overeating is called self-care, if people eat to stop feeling less
miserable. India went on to say that this works in the reverse - and that people who are underweight
starve themselves of feelings. India acknowledged that people are free to be the weight they choose,
but the consequences for Covid are stark, because people are twice as likely to die if they contract
the virus if they're overweight. India quoted from the Public Health England's website that the
annual spend on obesity and diabetes is greater than that for the police, the judiciary and
the fire services combined. She argued that the Government should be kind to people and not hide
the chocolates and tell people to get on their bikes. She suggested that providing obese people
with a simple, affordable, flexible plan for healthy eating and a personalized psychological
assessment of the causes of their overeating would be a more prudent use of money. The second
article is written by Stig Abel in his column, 'The Explainer' in the News Review section. It
was simply entitled 'Anxiety,' with a picture of the painting with the same title painted by Edvard
Munch in 1894 under the article. The subheading was 'The Crisis Shrank our World, Now the Idea
of a Return to Normal Life and all its Freedom is what Overwhelms us.' Stig's article reassured
people that the dizziness of freedom of coming out of lockdown with the anxieties and uncertainties
will pass, and that many people around us are, and I quote, 'silently reeling too'. In his article,
Stig wove his own experience of anxiety with that of anxiety from the literature. He said that the
word 'anxiety' comes from the Latin word to constrict, and said that anxiety is often
experienced as a physical sensation of constricted breathing or tightness across the chest. He cited
Hippocrates who described the symptoms of a man named Nicanorwho became frightened
of going to drinking parties as 'masses of terror rising up'. Stig said, and I quote,
'Carl Jung called anxiety fear spread thinly, something that lies lank across you, sapping
your spirit.' Stig said that specific stress is bad, but general anxiety is more pernicious. He
said that it is a feeling of dread that, because it cannot be reasoned with, can never be assuaged.
He said he has managed his anxiety over the years with exercise and by reading books, such as the
'narcotic soothing of detective fiction'. He stated that 1 in 3 people have experienced
anxiety, and these people may be lucky in that they may have been inoculated against the symptoms
of uncertainty and vaccinated by their prior distress. Thank you for listening. 'Bye for now.