Blog Action Day: How Jamie Oliver highlights UK poverty

Today is Blog Action Day and thousands of bloggers are uniting to talk about poverty.

Now I know that poverty is rife in the developing world, but sometimes I think people forget the poverty in developed countries.

In the UK, Jamie Oliver is midway through a series called Jamie’s Ministry of Food, where he’s attempting to get an entire town, Rotherham, to learn to cook properly.

I’m impressed by his drive and passion for the project and think it’s immensely honourable, but it’s just highlighted to me the problem many people have in affording ingredients.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s good that people are learning how to cook beef stir fry or chicken wrapped in prosciutto, but Jamie is paying for all these ingredients.

Once he leaves, how many people are going to be able to afford to buy these items: beef is expensive, even if you buy it diced and prepackaged. So is salmon, especially if you’re feeding a family.

I’m not denying that takeaways aren’t just as expensive, but food costs are spiralling and for many people, it’s tough to buy much of this food.

A feature in The Guardian a couple of weeks ago pointed out that it’s far cheaper to get calorific intake through ‘value’ high-fat sausages than good quality meat-packed bangers. The same is true for french fries and similar junk food.

This is why people eat takeaways. I’m not denying that people need to be better educated about food, but money talks and for the underclass in the UK it will always be more appealing to live on crap than learn how to cook and spend a little more!

Clap hands for singletons*

So you’ve managed to get a dose of herpes and aren’t currently dating. What on earth do you do?

Do you forget the idea of finding the ideal man or woman? Well, not any more, because the first dating site for STI sufferers has launched.

Date Positive is for the 1.8 million people out there who’ve been to a GUM clinic and have to be a little bit careful what they do when they get down to some duvet action.

Let’s face it, it must be tough for these people. Imagine going on a date with someone and them telling you over the creme brûlée that they’ve got HPV.

Mind you, it’d probably be preferable than finding out they really like listening to Celine Dion.

* No, I’m not sure the joke works either, but hey I tried

Seve Ballesteros joins the club

Seve BallesterosFollowing his collapse last week, it’s sad to hear that Seve Ballesteros has been diagnosed with a brain tumour.

The reason I’m more interested in this than any other normal health/sports story is that my dad also has a brain tumour.

Brain tumour conjures up lots of images and, to be honest, I’m still not sure I totally get it. Basically, there’s some sort of mass growing inside your head that slowly starts to cause problems as it puts pressure on various other bits of the brain.

Sometimes, they can be operated on, but more often than not brain tumours are treated using radiation therapy and chemotherapy.

Many shrink, often enough to be removed through surgery, but not all do. My dad has been through radiotherapy and one-and-a-half lots of chemo, until the consultants in charge decided to stop, because his particular tumour is resistant to the chemo.

Life expectancy is hazy. It can be as short as 1 year and sometimes as long as 10-15 years – it’s a bit ‘how long is a piece of string?’ I’m not even sure how long my Dad’s had his – it was diagnosed about 18 months – 2 years ago, but was obviously there before it was eventually picked up.

I’m sure Seve will have access to top specialists, but that may not be enough. Even if they do get it once, tumours have a nasty habit of reappearing and you can never be sure you’ve got it all the first time.

Good luck, Seve!