The KaiKai Book

At the Arkansas state fair, the gastronomic delights on offer leave most healthy thinking people with stomach ache. 'You know, we are famous in the South for frying everything. We fry our grandmothers,' reports one stall holder, brandishing a corn covered, oil soaked, deep fried sausage. But Governor Mike Huckabee wants to trim the fat. 'I was digging my grave with a knife and fork' he states, showing off his new physique, itself recently trimmed by over 50 kilos. Now he has become the first politician in the west to enforce annual weigh-ins for every one of Arkansas's 400,000 children. He has also imposed controls on school dinners and compulsory physical education.

Obesity is one of the biggest public health challenges facing the UK. In this new film, RCP special adviser on obesity Professor Rachel Batterham OBE meets leading experts and patients to consider what needs to be done to take meaningful action on this complex problem. The documentary explores the latest science on how and why people develop obesity and the most recent available treatments. It considers obesity through the lens of health inequalities: how some groups are more affected than others, and how reducing stigma and elevating the patient voice are crucial in tackling the issue.

Insecticides are sometimes necessary in farming. But some substances, like neonicotinoids, kill not only pests but bees as well. Now the Bayer Group, one of the main manufacturers of these pesticides, is coming under pressure. Scientists around the world have found that neonicotinoids are the main cause of mass bee deaths. Research has shown that a number of insecticides should have been banned long ago. For years, the Bayer Group has sought to silence the critics and pressure scientists into not publishing their findings. For more than two decades, experts have been warning of the negative effects of neonicotinoids, with a whole range of studies published on the subject. It would appear that the industry, aided by the authorities, managed to successfully delay any ban on these substances for years. Studies show that neonicotinoids not only kill pests, but also bees and other beneficial insects. Dutch toxicologist Henk Tennekes was among the first to recognize the problem. He believes neonicotinoids are the most toxic insecticides ever produced. He discovered a study carried out by Bayer itself, back in 1991, which found that a particular neonicotinoid had a negative effect on the nervous system of a fly species. These effects were said to be "irreversible”. Tennekes then confronted the company with his findings. He was taken aback by the response: "Bayer now claims” he says, "that the binding of critical receptors in the nervous system by neonicotinoids is reversible. So they’re contradicting the results of their own study. ... If they had considered what impact this substance has, they would have had to take it off the market." Scientists in France also analyzed mass bee deaths and likewise identified an insecticide made by Bayer as the culprit. Toxicologist Jean-Marc Bonmatin reveals how the company then sought to prevent the results from being published. Meanwhile, toxicologists in Japan discovered that neonicotinoids also harm other creatures, such as fish and river crabs. There too, Bayer sought to suppress publication.

Doctors predict that by 2030, half of the world's population will be overweight or obese. An epidemic of obesity is causing a rapid rise in diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer. It's becoming the biggest health challenge worldwide. Why has no country managed to stop this epidemic? The food industry and government authorities say it's due to a lack of individual self-discipline. Is this true? Or is it the result of collective failure -- a symptom of a liberal society that abhors obesity, yet produces people who are overweight. Is society itself to blame for this situation? Around the world, politicians, priests, doctors, and average people are standing up to multinational food corporations. They want to take back control of their nutrition and their bodies -- and they're using the law, scientific evidence, and political activism to correct the claim that people who are obese have only themselves to blame. These critics focus on sugary drinks that can be as addictive as some hard drugs; misleading advertising directed at children and low-income people; governments that turn a blind eye to junk-food companies; and lobbying that pushes the limits of legality. These people say that a "hostile takeover" of our food has been underway for four decades, and they're demanding new legislation to put a stop to it. This documentary investigates how Chile is leading the way in this struggle. Which country will be the next to confront the big food corporations in the name of public health?