So, apparently it’s ok to eat fish again. Thank goodness. Mahi mahi in Lemon Pepper Mustard Sauce. Mmmmmm….
Most people should eat more fish because of its health benefits, the U.S. Institute of Medicine reported on Tuesday, but added that consumers must also consider the risks of chemically contaminated seafood.
Silly me, I never really thought it wasn’t ok to eat fish, what with wild salmon being one of the Fourteen SuperFoods That Will Change Your Life and fish being a big part of the Mediterranean diet, which is good for your heart and sure to make you Sexy, Fit, and Fabulous! (like those Lebanese babes). More importantly, my mother and grandmother told me fish was brainfood when I was a wee tyke. This, of course, resulted in my violating the restrictions currently touted by the US Institute of Medicine on fish consumption by those under 12.
Another food I was allowed to eat in excessive was the incredible edible egg, which was bad for us through most of the 70s, 80s and 90s, but recently became good for us again. (You know, eggs are full of cholesterol. Of course so are the myelin sheaths that insulate our neurons…hmmm….and now it looks like cholesterol might be an antioxidant. Confused? So are the bureaucrats.) And I was allowed my allotment of ice cream, which may or may not be good for us yet, but certainly deserves a place in the libertarian diet next to fat, salt, meat, hot peppers and alcohol on quality of life grounds. For as long as I can remember, I’ve washed all that now good for me, now bad for me, now good for me, food down with coffee, of which two cups a day may cause heart disease and five cups a day may prevent Alzheimer’s disease.
All these agencies, institutes and associations playing their games of bad science and political pull are the main reason that government should stay out of health care and nutrition. While it’s naive to think that government could be a truly neutral arbiter helping consumers decide what’s good and bad in medicine and nutrition, at least if it limited itself to that role only those consumers who believed in it would be hurt. (Hate to be social darwinist…ok, I really don’t… but sometimes people get what they have coming to them.) On the other hand, ceding control over our health care and our food to government puts us all at the mercy of the bad decisions of bureaucrats and lobbyists. Is it possible the discovery of the “fact” that eggs were bad for us was delayed by agriculture lobbyists? Is it possible there are pharmaceutical lobbyists with companies producing statin drugs, trying to keep the word that cholesterol isn’t the cause of heart disease under wraps? The trial lawyers making billions off tobacco settlements certainly have reason to delay the big news yet to come, that the Indians (that would be Native Americans to you PC palefaces) were onto something all those years using the powerful medicine of nicotiana rustica.
What’s really amazing is that those whose slogan when it comes to birth control, abortion and marijuana is “hands off our bodies” are so often at the forefront of movements to tax, restrict and even ban the things that are out of PC favor like tobacco, trans fats, corn syrup and alcohol.
Fish is suddenly relatively cheap and easy to come by here in the Midwest, too, thanks for flash freezing and vacuum packing. See my review of the Orca Bay brand.
Eat more fish, study urges, despite toxin risk