Food security and deprivation
Several papers in this issue are related to deprivation and food securityReference Hadley, Borgerhoff Mulder and Fitzherbert1–Reference MacKeown, Pedro and Norris6. They originate not only from Africa (Tanzania and South Africa) but also from the USA, Canada, the UK and Ireland. The same issues apply whether in Africa, North America or Europe. Deprivation counts. Attitude counts. Provision of healthy foods counts. A socially supportive environment counts.
The Tanzanian paperReference Hadley, Borgerhoff Mulder and Fitzherbert1 points at the importance of friends and family who can chip in during seasonal insecurity. In closely knit societies, individuals from the same ethnic group seem to support each other better than over the boundaries of ethnicity. Of course, material wealth matters – or to put it crudely, a network of rich friends can support in a more efficient manner.
The UK paper is from WalesReference Burr, Trembeth, Jones, Geen, Lynch and Roberts2. This shows that advice to drink more juice counts for much less than getting a voucher for doing so, among pregnant women in a deprived neighbourhood.
The public health nutrition work force in Canada
Rideout et al. Reference Rideout, Riches, Ostry, Buckingham and MacRae3 recommend the use of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms7 in the efforts to protect the right to food. The importance of public health nutrition actors in pushing for food rights in Canada is emphasised: a lobby could contribute forcefully to increase the political will for food policy measures. I send my support to the Canadians for building their public health nutrition network, capacity and strength!
Go green for old age
The European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition project keeps delivering valuable information regarding diet and health in Europe, this time on the elderlyReference Bamia, Trichopoulos, Ferrari, Overvad, Bjerregaard and Tjønneland8. The results from this massive cohort of almost 75 000 participants show that a diet rich in plant foods is associated with lower all-cause mortality. We look forward to receiving more results.
Gender alpha or omega?
To follow up on the gender editorialReference Yngve9 in this issue, I made an effort to count the authors in this issue and work out their gender based on first names. This is what I found. Out of 12 papers, three did not include full names of authors, which made gender analysis impossible. Of the rest, it turns out that seven out of nine papers had a female first author (78%). Altogether we had a large number of authors this time and 47 out of 78 (60%) were female. When looking more closely at the last author, who at least in Europe is the most experienced one and which position counts in academic promotion, five out of nine were female (56%).
This little exercise illustrates first the problem of not getting this information first hand but having to work from names and sometimes not being able to do so, since first names are not provided. Second, it shows us that in this issue we have more female than male authors, which is what should be expected in the area of nutrition, with so many female students. Regular monitoring of the gender of authors can provide us with the full picture.
