Factory food

Tournaments like the World Cup often serve as a reminder that our different languages and cultures across the globe remain distinctive and individual.

But when it comes to what we eat there is growing evidence that traditional diversity is being eroded.

Flicking between TV channels during mundane moments of the Germany versus Algeria World Cup match last evening I came across an interesting documentary on Channel 4.

‘The World’s Best Diet’ was a compelling exploration of the dietary habits of people all over the world, ranking the best and worst diets and asking what we should be eating.

It revealed how eating habits across the globe have transformed over the last 50 years - and how this has affected our health.

For the record England came in at number 34 of the 50 nations surveyed. And top of the diet pops was Iceland, where fresh fish is a staple.

I was surprised to learn that inhabitants of the Marshall Islands in the remote Northern Pacific now have the worst ranked diet - and highest rates of death by diabetes - largely because their traditional farming has been replaced by additive-filled American imports.

Overall, the message of the programme was clear - stay away as much as possible from all kinds of processed food.

But somehow all this talk of healthy eating seems to have the opposite effect and I just can’t resist the urge to pop out and buy a Snickers bar - or should that be a Marathon?

LED lighting's dark side

New LED street lighting being installed by councils throughout the country to save money and cut carbon emissions could mean more sleepless nights and ultimately be bad for our health.

A study by the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE) says some eco-friendly low-energy LED (light emitting diode) street lighting creates unnecessary glare and might have serious effects on people’s well-being.

Light pollution expert Martin Morgan-Taylor has called for more research into which wavelengths, levels and durations of lighting pose health threats - and how this compares with modern lighting practices.

The lecturer - from Leicester’s De Montfort University - says medical research is increasingly linking LED lighting with more serious health issues such as cancer and depression.

"Artificial lighting is known to have negative effects on human health and well-being if sleep is disrupted by bright light shining into bedroom windows," he said.

"What we know is that ‘white’ or ‘blue-rich’ lighting - which mimics natural daylight - is being increasingly used at night.

"This type of light suppresses the production of a circadian rhythm hormone called melatonin, which is believed to be a powerful anti-oxidant that helps to ward off some cancers," he said.

The CPRE report, ‘Shedding Light – a survey of local authority approaches to lighting in England’ is the first piece of research to ask councils how they control light pollution.

Councils are urged to give ‘careful consideration’ to the type of LED lighting they use and weigh the potential impacts that higher temperature blue-rich lighting has on ecology and human health.

The report says authorities across England could be doing more to reduce the impact of light pollution and be saving hundreds of thousands of pounds a year in the process by using dimming schemes.

It also urges councils to preserve dark skies by having a ‘presumption against’ new lighting in existing dark areas and preventing ‘inappropriate and badly designed development’ that masks views of the night sky.

But according to the survey of 83 local authorities fewer than two thirds of councils in England are actively seeking to minimise the impact of bad lighting - despite recent changes to planning laws which encourage them to do so.

The CPRE also recommends new street lighting should be tested ‘in situ’ before schemes are rolled out across wider areas to ensure that it is the minimum required for the task and does not cause a nuisance to residents.

Street lighting in England costs councils around £616m a year and can account for up to 30% of their carbon emissions.

The CPRE study reveals that despite the number of people living with severe light pollution around the country growing more than a third of councils have no formal policy in place.

Almost half of councils responding said they were involved in dimming street lights in their areas and a third say they are now switching off street lights - typically between midnight and 5am.

The research found dimming schemes are significantly more popular with residents than switch off schemes - with 68 per cent of respondents saying local communities had been very supportive.

Some council schemes to replace old-style sodium ‘orange’ street lighting with new LED lamps have attracted criticism from nearby residents.

Last month people in a west London borough complained that new LED street lamps were so bright they were no longer getting a good night's sleep.

Hounslow council started using the lights as part of a multi-million pound improvement scheme but people living close to the new LED lighting described it is ‘like living on a floodlit soccer pitch’.

Elsewhere, Leicester city council is updating 32,000 of its 37,000 street lights as part of a commitment to reduce the council's carbon footprint by 50% before 2025.

The three year £13.9m project began in March 2013 and will contribute an estimated saving of 5,350 tonnes of carbon emissions per annum.

It includes a Central Management System (CMS) for remote control of lighting levels in specific areas, allowing dimmed lighting, for example, in the early hours before dawn.

The council says replacing its existing stock with LED lighting will reduce energy usage and carbon emissions by over 40% compared with current levels, saving electricity charges (at 2013 prices) of £0.84m a year.

Using a CMS should provide a further 17% reduction, increasing the overall savings to 57% of current energy usage and carbon emissions, and slashing a total of £1.2m off its annual electricity bill.


Aerial view of Leicester city centre at night clearly showing the streets
where new white LED lighting has already been installed.

Other councils are, however, taking a more cautious route. In Essex, the streets have been equipped with one of the world’s largest wireless street lighting control systems.

Around 125,000 of the county’s street lights have been wirelessly linked, allowing centralised control and fault detection.

The council expects to reduce the energy cost of street lighting by around £1.3 million per year and to cut annual carbon emissions by over 8,000 tons.

Earlier this year Trafford council in Manchester delayed its £9.3m scheme to replace all its 27,000 street lights after a resident threatened High Court action.

Simon Nicholas, a chartered engineer and businessman, raised concerns that new LED lighting had the potential to cause health problems.

"We're breaking new ground here and new evidence is emerging all the time," he said. "The council has not fully taken these studies into account."

Mr Nicholas claimed some councils are not looking at the bigger picture ."LEDs are currently on an exponential curve in terms of development," he said.

"In five years’ time we may well have really good LED street lights. Anyone charging in now is making a huge mistake."

Emma Marrington, CPRE Dark Skies campaigner and author of the ‘Shedding Light’ report, said: "Many local authorities are taking steps in the right direction but much more can be done.

"We urge councils to do more to control lighting in their areas and ensure that the right lighting is used only where and when it is needed."

She said the research had revealed no evidence to support the fear that adjusting or dimming street lights impacted on public safety.

"We're not advocating changes where they're not appropriate - but why shine bright lights on residential streets, quiet roads and open countryside throughout the night when it's not needed?

"Genuine dark starry nights are becoming harder and harder to find which is why councils should take action to control it now. Light pollution blurs the distinction between town and country, ruins the countryside's tranquil character and denies us the experience of a truly starry sky."

The Lighthouse Keeper is written by Clive Simpson - for more information, commission
enquiries or to re-publish any of his articles click here for contact information

You are what you sleep

Margaret Thatcher was once famous for promoting the adage that she could thrive and work effectively on only a few hours sleep per night.

And, though there are exceptions to every rule, for the large majority of us it is not the same - we ignore sleep at our peril.

A report today for the BBC's ‘Day of the Body Clock’ asserts that society has become ‘supremely arrogant’ in ignoring the importance of sleep.

Leading researchers from Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Manchester and Surrey universities have warned that cutting back on sleep is leading to serious health problems.

Scientists have warned that our modern life and 24 hour society mean many people are now ‘living against’ their body clocks with damaging consequences for health and well-being.

We all know that lack of regular sleep can affect our mood, vitality and energy levels. But cancer, heart disease, type-2 diabetes, infections and obesity have also all been linked to reduced sleep.

Prof Russell Foster, from the University of Oxford, told the BBC that people are now getting on average between one and two hours less sleep a night than 60 years ago.

"We are the supremely arrogant species because we feel we can ignore the fact that we have evolved under a light-dark cycle,” he said.

“What we do as a species, perhaps uniquely, is override the clock. And long-term acting against the clock can lead to serious health problems.”

Regular readers of ‘The Lighthouse Keeper’ will know that the natural rhythms of life, and of light and darkness, have been discussed at frequent intervals.

Harvard University’s Prof Charles Czeisler confirmed that light is the “most  powerful synchroniser” of our internal biological clocks.

He said energy efficient light bulbs as well as TVs, smart phones, tablets and computers had high levels of light in the blue end of the spectrum, which is "right in the sweet spot" for disrupting the body clock.

“Light exposure, especially short wavelength blue-ish light in the evening, will reset our circadian rhythms to a later hour, postponing the release of the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin and making it more difficult for us to get up in the morning.

“It’s a big concern that we're being exposed to much more light, sleeping less and, as a consequence, may suffer from many chronic diseases.”

In ‘Blinded by the night’ I noted that an increasing number of scientific studies were questioning the long-held premise that humans are largely immune to the effects of artificial light at night.

Today, or to be correct, tonight, we have levels of light hundreds and thousands of time higher than the natural level during the night – and light pollution is currently rising by a general average of 20 percent a year.

What is happening in the streets outside our homes is not always within our control. But we can take more personal responsibility when it comes to the light behind closed doors.

In his book ‘A Great Day at the Office’, Dr John Briffa discusses sleep as one of the strategies to help maximise our energy and performance levels.

“Light exposure in the day promotes better sleep but it may have the reserve effect late in the evening,” he says.

“In one study, light exposure from room lighting was found to delay meltonin exposure by about 90 minutes. Turning room lighting down, or perhaps off altogether (and using dimly lit lamps) during the evening may help sleep.”

I covered the topic of how excessive light at night affect our sleep and health more extensively in ‘Early morning birdsong’.

If you don’t sleep too well at night then it is probably a good idea, according to Dr Briffa, to be mindful of the potential impact of evening light levels on sleep.

TVs, laptops, tablets and smart phones - with their blue-rich light - can all suppress melatonin function too so avoiding the use of these within a couple of hours of bedtime may be a helpful - though impossibly hard - tactic to implement.


The Lighthouse Keeper is written by Clive Simpson - for more information, commission
enquiries or to re-publish any of his articles click here for contact information

A Great Day at the Office

You may have heard him on the radio or seen him on the television commenting on health issues, nutrition and medical research.

I first met Dr John Briffa in real life at a corporate well-being staff conference in Peterborough last autumn when he challenged delegates with the question ‘Are you putting diesel in your petrol engine?’

 

His new book, published at the start of the year, follows a similar theme. It is aimed at helping us all get more out of our working day and, just as importantly, having enough in reserve for the time leftover.

 

The premise of ‘A Great Day at the Office’ is to unwrap a series of simple strategies offering us the chance in the process to recharge our batteries and take our workaday effectiveness and productivity to new heights.

 

Sounds like just what we need in our modern world where potential stress points lie at every turn?

 

Drawing on recent studies and his own real-world experience, Dr Briffa’s purpose is to equip us with the knowledge required to run our body and brain as efficiently as a finely-tuned machine.

 

His book explores fundamental factors that determine our vitality, mental functioning and mood - and how to put them together to enhance performance and sustainability.

 

It offers a number of insights into a broad range of influential factors - diet, physical activity, sound and light exposure, breathing, psychology and sleep.

 

The key ‘takes’ from ‘A Great Day at the Office’ could be rounded up as follows:

• A crucial dietary tactic that ensures sustained levels of energy throughout the day with no ‘mid-afternoon slump’.
• Common but under-recognised causes of insomnia, and how to get the sort of deep, restful sleep that leaves us fully revived in the morning.
• A simple breathing exercise that can induce a state of calm and focus in just a few seconds.
• How to maintain health and fitness in as time-efficient a way as possible, and without the need for a gym or exhausting exercise.
• How to use light technology to optimise sleep, mental functioning and mood.
• Three simple psychological strategies that harmonise body and mind.
• A mental ‘trick’ for banishing bad habits and establishing healthy ones – with ease.

By putting just some of the strategies offered into practice Dr Bfriffa suggests we stand to be rewarded with a tangible increase in energy and vitality, along with the ability to ‘get more done’.

 

To gain maximum benefit from his advice and assess its personal relevance you probably need to read the book for yourself.

 

But as a taster - and at the risk of being taken out of context - here is a para-phrased summary of some randomly selected hot tips:

 

Value sleep

This is not an unproductive time - it actually prepares the body both physiologically and psychologically for the day ahead. So, go to bed earlier because an hour of sleep before midnight is worth two after.

 

Brain dump

Write a ‘to do’ list for the next day rather than letting lots of anxious thoughts run through your head in bed.

 

Limit caffeine

It’s a stimulant. Alcohol too has the capacity to disrupt sleep and has been shown to suppress REM sleep, which may impact on mental functions.

 

Alcohol also disrupts blood-sugar levels - a peak in blood sugar caused by alcohol in the evening can lead to a trough in the middle of the night.

 

The body will then correct this by secreting hormones, such as adrenalin and cortisol, that stimulate the release of sugar from the liver. These are also major stress hormones – the last thing we need coursing through our system when we also need deep, restorative sleep.

 

Lighten up

Melatonin (which helps us sleep) is made from the brain chemical serotonin. Lack of sunlight during the day can lower serotonin and reduce melatonin at night.

 

Darken up

This includes the lighting from tablets, televisions and laptops. Set a time each evening for turning off all electronic equipment.

 

Regular readers of this blog will also be aware that excessive ‘light at night’ and the creeping effects of light pollution have been the subject of some of most popular Lighthouse Keeper posts. See Blinded by the night if you missed out and want to read some more.

 

‘A Great Day at the Office’ might not be for everyone because, if we had the time to really sit down and think about it, much of the advice could be classed as good old-fashioned common sense.

 

But in our time-hungry world we are all too easily cast drift and caught in the fast-moving currents of corporate business life and modern consumerism.

 

And sometimes it is helpful to have some practical answers, alternative solutions and justifications laid out before us - this is just such a book.

    

‘A Great Day at the Office: Simple Strategies to Maximise Your Energy and Get More Done Easily’ by Dr John Briffa is published in paperback by Fourth Estate, ISBN 978-0-00-754791-3 and is available from local bookstores and Amazon.

 

 

Note: title not to be confused with a previous Lighthouse Keeper blog ‘A good day at the office’ in which our Prime Minister David Cameron was adjudged to be having a bad hair day after bathing in the afterglow of Andy Murray’s historic Wimbledon victory.

 

The Lighthouse Keeper is written by Clive Simpson - for more information or to get in touch click here